Hidden Fire - The Story of Alex Sheathes
by E.W.S. Miami
Summary: This is my own story of the life of Alex Sheathes. It is told through the point of view of Alex Sheathes and includes the point of view of other characters from Lauren Oliver's Trilogy. Story-lines and conversations from the original are preserved although additional characters have been explored and history has been added. Reviews are always welcomed.
1. Chapter 1

Hidden Fire:

The Story of Alex Sheathes

* * *

Introduction

This story takes place during Lauren Oliver's Delirium. Its setting is outside Portland in the forests that surround its fences. The place is known to the people inside Portland as the Wilds, but to those who were born there, they call it home. This story is from the eyes of a boy who grows up wondering who is, and who is to become. This is the story from the eyes of Alex.

* * *

the wilds

amor _delirium_ nervosa

one

_The moon so far and yet so close, _

_Hanging alone in the dark sky,_

_The light shines so brightly,_

_A reflection of something bigger_

The stars look bright tonight. The light that comes from it almost like small flash lights that trickle through the branches and through the leaves. It almost looks like it is raining light. Although many people do not like the darkness, I don't mind it; it hides away all the ugliness of the world. The crickets are the only thing that we hear at night. Through the quiet murmurs of our little community many people do not talk about life before the flashes. They don't talk about the things that use to bring them joy.

She comes to me and leads me over to our small trailer in the Crest Village Mobile Park. There are small fires that surround each little house. Some of the people around us acknowledge us as we walk by. There are others though that just stares out, like there is nothing inside. They always told me that when you do that, you not only die on the inside but you die on the outside, one of the things that you have to be careful here.

Our trailer is nothing really special but it is ours. It is the only place that I know to be home. Two small beds and a small kitchen, really not that much room at all. There is only one thing that I love about our home. The books. The enormous amount of books. There were of a life before the restrictions, showed how dreams were allowed to run free and wide. The books, how the writers had this amazing imagination and would write about the far off places. The epic quest, and the adventure that was sparked by one thought, a single word. That was before everything changed, and all that was called a shadow. That is what they call life before the wilds. The forgotten years are more the way I see it. Every time I ask her about those years she always tells me.

"Why remember the past; when all it does is bring you nightmares."

The past; all it does for me is bring questions. Where did I come from, where do I fit in, who my father was? I don't push, but I do wonder about him. All I get is that he died a couple of years ago before I could even know him. There are times when I would hear her cry in the night time. Through the pillows that she thinks covers the sobbing. It seems like the pain of loosing someone is something that is still hard for her to come to terms with. Those emotions though end just there, grief it seems traps the emotions. It seems that it is the only way she knows how to live, trapped in the emotions of the sadness that only she knows.

I just lie there looking at her as she gets ready for bed. The candle light flickers softly, and it barely shows me the silhouette there putting everything away for the day. She turns and sees my eyes trained on hers, the hardness of her eyes slowly disappears and a soft smile comes on her face.

"You thinking about him," she asks.

"Hard not to," I say. "What was he like?"

"He was an amazing man," she says. "He taught me about all the things that I had been missing."

"Do you miss him," I ask.

"Every day," she says.

She walks over to me and sits on the edge of my bed. She brushes aside my hair and finally takes a deep breath.

I still remember a couple of years ago, when I heard her in the quiet whispers of the night. I still don't know what made me get up that night, but when I did; my eyes were fixated on a lone fire from a candle. Everything around the trailer had gotten quiet and even the crickets must have gone to sleep. That is when I heard her with a small book. She was reading something to herself.

"I carry your heart with me, I carry it in my heart, I am never without it."

I never mentioned it to her, because it seems so private. It was something that only she could understand, only something that she would remember. The words though, I would repeat them over and over in my mind, something about them, so beautiful and so delicate. It was almost as it traveled on the whispers of the wind. All I can imagine was a sort of dance between two people, an intimate dance.

Her smile for the first time in a long time isn't as dazed or forced as before, but genuine and warm. As she walks away from me, I can still hear what she says, and I don't know if she meant to say it so loudly enough so that I could hear it. I don't know if it hurts her to say it or help her to say it.

"You are so much like him."

She covers herself with the blanket that she made out of pieces of other blankets. She blows out the candle and there in the darkness all I can see are her eyes staring at me. After a couple of minutes, her eyes close and finally she is asleep.

From what I can tell she is about 33 years old. Her eyes sometimes have this glaze look on it, almost as if she is in another world. The wavy dirty blonde hair she keeps it just below her shoulders, mostly in a pony tail to keep it from getting all tangled up. The books keep her ground, she told me once. It kept her remembering of a life that was surrounded by this one thought, this one emotion, everyone around this place doesn't really mention it, it is almost as if brings up everything that is wrong with this world. It reminds them that they live in a world that has tried to destroy this word, the word of love. She doesn't say the word love a lot, almost as if it hurts too much to think of it, but the one time she did say it, it was almost magical, the way the word just lit up her face.

I had always wondered what life was like in the forgotten years. From what information I got about life in the forgotten years, was that she lived in Portland, a city that is about 2 miles east of where we are. It is one of the fence cities of the new government. It is where the government believes that everyone is cured. The government tells you that in these fenced cities you are safe. In these cities you can walk down the street and have your whole life in front of you. That everyone is safe from the disease.

Thought, the very notion of this causes me to move my blanket off my feet. Looking up at the ceiling, the smooth metallic roof, I feel as if the walls have begun to shrink. All around me, I feel as if the ceiling is too low and instead of it being a cozy trailer, it feels…it feels like a coffin.

I stand up slowly as to not wake up her up. My hands fumble on the ground looking for the shoes that I had just taken off. The tin floor sting with the cold pain that is associated with it. Finally after a couple of seconds I find my shoes and sliding them on, I stand quietly. The springs on the bed makes it familiar creaking sound. I stand there as a statue closing my eyes, trying to hide in the darkness of my own mind. My breath held tightly in the lungs of my chest. Once I realize that if I do not let out the air from lungs that I would pass out, I slowly exhale through my lips.

Walking over to the wall, I feel my way to the door and finally after some maneuvering the door pop open without a sound. The cool air welcomes my lungs as if I had held my breath. I can't even feel the pain of the cool air on my muscles; either that or I probably don't care.

Slowly closing the door, I cup my hands and blow hot air into them. The darkness from the night calms me in a way that only I could know. Being outside in a place that has no walls, no restrictions, it keeps me from feeling as if I am in a prison.

I walk along the same path that I had taken yesterday. Trying to recount what I was told, everything almost seemed like it was so far away.

"What was life like back in the forgotten years," I ask.

"Why do you ask things that will only bring up…" she starts.

"Nightmare?" I finish. "Because it is hard to know who you are, when you do not know where you come from?"

She looks at me, with a sort of surprised look. It was the very first time that I had spoken to her in this way. Ever since I was ten, she had been telling me that not to worry about it. But it is all that I have been, over and over again. It basically consumed my thoughts.

"Look at me," I say. "Mom, I feel like a shadow, I don't know who I am."

There is a pain in her eyes. The tears have already begun to pool around her eyes.

"I know it hurts, but can't you see that I am in pain," I say. "Please. Just tell me. Something, anything, I want to know that I belong somewhere."

She looks up to the sky almost as if she is asking for permission. It is only a glimpse upward but it is enough, because as she looks down, she extends her hand to me.

"Come," she says. "I have to show you something."

I hesitate for a moment and finally give in and she grabs onto my hand. We walk through the night sky, for a couple of minutes until we find ourselves on an abandon street. We had never traveled this far out of our little community. This time though, we walked as if she knew where we were going. We dodged cars that were left on the street until we finally made it to some old town. Some of the buildings were still standing, obviously emptied long ago. At the end of the block there was what I imagined was an old church. It had fallen down a while back. The black marks still engraved on the walls where the fire came out of. I wonder though if it was the bombers or if it was just the town's people burning everything.

She walks over to an old gate next to the church and stops at it. It is almost as if she is struggling inside herself on whether or not to continue. She looks back one time and sees my eyes looking for the answer. Turning around she finally touches the small latch and unhinges the gate. The creaking sound still to this day gives me an uneasy feeling. The moonlight allows us to finally come to a place underneath an old tree.

She stops and let's goes of my hand. Pointing at the base of the tree, she turns around and says to me these words.

"I am sorry, but I made a promise to an old friend," she says.

I walk over to the base of the tree and there is an unmarked grave with the words 'Sheathes' on it.

I turn around and look at her.

"Mom," I say before she cuts me off.

"I wish I was," she says. "Every day that I see you grow up, I see them in you."

Confused, I try to make sense of what she is trying to say to me.

"What do you mean, them?" I say.

"I am sorry," she says hanging her head hang low. "I am not your mother, she is buried right there."

Turning around all I see is darkness, all I feel is pain. What I know now, is not anything that gets me closer to them, to finding out who I am. It is only a darker realization, that I am all alone in this world, an orphan like the moon above. There it stands, the moon, hanging alone in the dark sky.


	2. Chapter 2

two

My body moves to the rhythm of the wild. My feet walk one in front of the other, not knowing where I am going, but just letting go and allowing my heart to guide me. The tightness in my chest causes me to walk quicker and quicker, trying to get in more air into my lungs. I don't know how far I run, but all I know is that I made it to the endless road. It could have been that I had always wanted to go back, or probably something inside of me needed to go back.

Finally making it to the burned out church I just stood there in the cold weather standing before the gate. I can see it in the distance, the tree there in the shadow. If you didn't know to look for it, you probably wouldn't see it. The creaking sound still causes a shiver down my spine. It is enough to remind me of who is here. The steps are lighter for some odd reason. The creaking sound still causes a shiver down my spine. It is enough to remind me of who is here. The steps are lighter for some odd reason. The creaking sound still causes a shiver down my spine. It is enough to remind me of who is here. The steps are lighter for some odd reason. It maybe my imagination but everything seems to slow down.

I just stand there looking down at it. The small stone with words painted on it.

'Sheathes'

I just kneel next to it. The dirt is hard and with my finger I follow the letters slowly and think about it. She told me that it was our last name back in the forgotten years.

"Alex," I hear someone call from behind me.

I turn around and see her there just looking at me with eyes of worry. Her arms are crossed and the torn sweater just covers barely her skin. It was something that she had found on one of our walks along the town.

"Tell me," I say standing up to my feet. The cool breeze slowly stops and I know that although she has given me something that I longed for it is something that has also awakened in me a thirst for more.

"Do you really want to know," she says. "It won't change who you are, it will only bring you more questions."

It is something that I had thought of. I want to know everything that she does, everything about her, about him.

"I do," I say.

"It was years ago," she starts. "You were still a small little baby, probably three or even four. You had just started to walk when it started to snow. You have to remember back then, we didn't have the trailer park, and we were just wandering back then, trying to keep ourselves alive."

She starts to rub her arms and I can tell that it isn't easy to talk about this.

"Your mom was my best friend," she says. "We looked out for each other right up to the end. She loved you so much, because you were the only thing left of your father that she had. She got sick…"

She stops and puts her sleeve up her face whipping what I believe are tears.

"We didn't have any medicine," she says. "So we couldn't… there was no way…"

I walk over to her and through my own tears I can understand what they had to go through. The cold winters without the trailer park, without our wood stove, I don't know how we would have made it. The winters are hard here in the wilds but we make it by coming together as a community. It is the only way to survive.

My hand touches hers and I can feel her trembling. The touch causes her to jerk back in pain until she opens her eyes and see that it is just my hand.

"It is okay," I say.

"I made a promise to her before she," she starts to say. "To always look out for you, and to make sure that you made it. After your father, we didn't know what to do. He was taken…"

The words cause me to jerk back and wonder what she meant. Taken? She had always told me that he was dead. That he died long ago. Taken isn't the same as dead, it isn't the same as dying.

"What do you mean…taken," I say. "I thought he was dead."

"He is," she says.

"How do you know for sure? Did you see him die? Did she?" I say pointing to the grave.

"They were separated when they made their escape," she responds. "From what she told me, he never came, she waited and came back to the spot many times after, and he never came."

There is a thought though. Never seeing either of them, there is a longing to know, to know them both. Looking back towards the grave, I walk back and kneel to the marker. Taking two fingers to my lips I place them lightly on the edge. It is then that I make a promise to her, to myself.

In my mind there is only one thing, only one thought. I have to go back. I need to see it for myself. It was what was going to happen all along. Sooner or later, after I found out, I would go and seek out my own answers. The thing that is left before me is how to do it.

The only way that I am going to be able to go back is through the resistance.

Walking back it is not enough to have some sort of fear in my heart. The stories that you hear about the cities, how everyone act like zombies, well that is the common story. Whenever people in our community start to talk about the forgotten years, the stories that you hear about medical procedures to remove parts of you.

For every city that is enclosed in a fence, there is always a resistance inside it. People that go against the new world order, that question what they are told. All we have is the memories of a life before, and if they can get them to forget it, then the wilds, the people who live here don't exist.

It will have to be in the next couple of days. I heard that the resistance has a camp about a day or two south of where we are. If I am going to get into Portland they are the only ones to do it. I try and not make any more problems for the woman who is taking care of me. After all, in a few days I will leave this place and I don't know if I would ever be able to come back.

As we walk back, I see that Christine is walking more comfortably than she has in the past. It must have been hard to hold this secret in for so many years and pretend to have a connection with someone that really is a complete stranger to me. The trees look almost to come alive in the moon light. The outline of the branches almost looks as if they move like arms dancing in the wind. The soft snow seems to be less and less every day, and everyone back in the community is anticipating the coming spring. It has been a hard winter and food has been scarce but by sharing our food we have been able to make it through.

In the distance I see the community park. It seems that someone has kept a fire going. The shadows dance with the small fire going.

"I see you have found him," I hear someone says.

Turning around I see it is Grandpa Jones. Out of all of us here in the community he is the oldest one, in both age and amount of time here in the Wilds. Once I heard that he was around eighty years old, and was there for first bombings. He doesn't really talk about it, though, everyone suspects though as sometimes his nightmares are about bombs and people being burned alive. Many of the people here have seen things that we keep to ourselves. He stokes the fire with a stick and as we walk by Michelle nods.

I stop in front of Grandpa Jones. He looks up and when the fire catches his eyes it is almost as if the past is re-kindled.

He taps the log that he is sitting on and motions me to sit.

Christine turns around and tells me that it is okay, that she will wait for me back in our home. Sitting down next to him, I can smell the burning fire next to him. Grandpa Jones may not look it, but he is in great shape. Looking at his hands and I know that probably in his previous life, he did manual labor.

We just sit there for a while, looking at the fire. Time is relative here in the Wilds, so who knows how long we actually just sit there in the silence. Finally after a while, he clears his throat.

"So you know," he says.

"Yes," I say.

"Understand that she did what she believed was best for you," he says. "What your mother would have wanted."

"I know," I say.

"Now there is a question," he says. "Are you satisfied with knowing what you do?"

I have to stop and think about it. Am I satisfied with knowing that my mother died a while back, and that my father may be still alive but more than likely is dead? It is hard to say, because inside of me there has always been a hole, and I never knew that it was because I didn't know the full story.

"Honestly," I say. "No."

He continues to move the fire, keeping it from going out. Then he just stops and places the wood branch into the fire. He turns to the side and grabs something from the backpack. He hands it to me and there I see his facial expression. It is one of compassion and understanding.

"Blue brings you back here," he says. "Green takes you to camps. It is a day journey; you would have to get up at the crack of dawn which should be in a couple of hours from now if you are going to make it by sunset."

I look at the paper that he had handed to me. Opening it, I see that it is a rough map of the area. One has labeled blue and another green. One says in blue, "home" and the other location says "camp."

"Camp?" I say with a question. "What is there?"

"The rebellion," he says. "When you get there, just tell them 'Trojan horse.' They will know what that means."

He speaks in code, almost as if there are people around us that might not approve. He looks around as if to see if anyone is looking at us. I follow his eyes and making sure that there was no one there looking or overhearing our conversations. After a couple of seconds he turns and looks at me in the eyes.

"She can't know," he says. "If she knew, she would stop you."

Just like that and I know who he is talking about. So if I am going to go anywhere it would have to be with no one knowing.

I nod that I understand and stand walking away from him. Once getting to the trailer, I look back and see that he has already begun to kick dirt on the fire essentially putting it out. It may not seem like but Grandpa Joe has done something for me that no one else did, he treated me like my ideas mattered, like I wasn't some child.

"If anyone can get you any answers, it would be there," he says.

"She won't understand," I say, knowing full well that my concern now has changed from me to her.

"No one would," he says. "But could you honestly live your life knowing that you never got the answers you were looking for?"

The idea of growing up, finding someone out here to settle down with and then never really knowing, I don't know if I could.

"Well how could the rebellion help?" I ask.

"It is the only way you can get into Portland," he says. "That is what you want to do no? They are the only ones that know how to get in, safely, and how to blend in."

Christine stands there waiting for me at the door of the trailer. Her arms are crossed and a look of relief and worry are both on her face.

"Did it help?" She asked. "He asked me to talk to you privately about what had happened."

"It did," I say walking inside.

She follows me in and waits for me to get into bed. She sits on the edge of my bed and looks at me.

"You know that although I may not be your mother, I care about you very much," she says. "You know that right?"

It is sweet and I know that she truly means it. I wonder though how my mother was. Obviously I cannot ask her that, without hurting her feelings, so it will have to be something that I learn all by myself. It has been a long road for her, she has struggled through having to raise me, without knowing how to and for that I must be glad that she was there.

"I know," I say grabbing her hand. "I care about you as well. Thank you for telling me the truth."

She clears her throat and stands up slowly. Once up she lets out a sigh and walks over to her bed. She sits on the edge of her bed and then lies down on her man-made pillow. She lies there on her side looking at me. We just lie there looking at each other from the ends of the trailer. Silence is all we have that night and I know that tomorrow night, if all goes well, then I will probably never see her again.

I close my eyes for a couple of minutes, and then when I open it, I see that her eyes are still closed. Sitting up, I make as little noise as possible while walking towards a backpack that I use sometimes while out setting up traps. Placing a change of clothes, my hunting knife, flash light, I hide the pack as my pillow. It is not as softest as my pillow of folded clothes but it does keep me from forgetting anything.

Finally letting out a deep sigh of relief, I think about what I will find tomorrow. I haven't really been away from the community longer than a day and that was because I had gotten lost and was younger. All that keeps coming in my mind rattling like a can in a room is he still alive?


	3. Chapter 3

three

The sun light burst through the holes in our house. They touch spots here and there throughout the trailer. When I was younger, I would try and count the number of spots that it hits. We don't really talk about it, but the holes, perfect and round wasn't caused by animals, but by a long feared enemy, the bullets that came from guns of the people in the fenced cities.

All I can remember is growing up here with the people that believed that although we would never fully know each of them, their past, and their lives prior to being in the Wilds, we have protected each other. We have seen each other at our worst and still we have looked out for each other. They say that it is because of the disease that we feel this way towards each other. Really I don't know how people can label it bad if it causes you protect the ones you care about.

Looking over I see that the bed is made already and can assume that Christine is already up and out getting fresh water from the nearby stream. It is now or never, the time has finally come to make a decision either I go now and look or the answers that I have been seeking, or forever just live with fact that I might not even know who I was. I feel the bag there underneath my head and already know two things, never use your bag for a pillow as my hurting neck is letting me know, and that I cannot live fully if there is a chance that he could be alive.

Getting up I make my way to the door and for a moment I just stop there looking around. There are so many great memories here, and so much love that I have to pause and wonder if I am doing the right thing. It is then that something catches my eyes. From the mountain of books, that I see around my eye catches onto one specific book that is on the top of a pile of books on the floor.

Walking over, I look at it and I don't know why I do, but I pick up the book and put it in the bag. It is the only thing that I take from my life here. I guess it is a way to connect, to keep myself from forgetting. Taking a breath, I open the door and look to the sides first to make sure that Christine is not near. There is no one outside and I fear that in a couple of minutes someone will open their door from their homes and see me leaving. It isn't something new, for people to go out hunting, but word travels fast here and if asked no one really knows where I am going, only that I am gone.

I walk quickly through the brush where Grandpa Joe had pointed yesterday. There is a purpose behind every step that I take; it is like for the first time, I walk to an answer. The Wilds have this sense of newness every day; it is as if, that it can exist on its own, without us. There is a freedom in knowing that when we are long gone, that the Wilds will continue to be free.

After about a fifteen minute walk, I see it, the trunk of a tree that has a small patch of green painted on it. It is one of the markers that Grandpa Joe told me about. He mentioned that if I could follow the markers I would have no problem getting there. I pick up the pace and continue walking, thinking about what I would find at the camp when I get there.

It takes me almost the whole day, walking finding markers, making some of my own. That is when it hits me. Who knows if Grandpa Joe was even telling the truth, or if he even knew where the camp of the rebellion was. He could have been just making it up, or even be crazy enough to believe it. The doubt as I learn has a paralyzing effect on ones will, because all I could do is just sit on a log and eat the last of the food that I had packed.

I look around and would have to find shelter soon if I can't find the camp before then. It is then that I hear it, a faint snap of a twig. It was something that I had learned from Christine.

"Alex," she says with a stern voice pointing down at a trap. "This is important, if you are caught out here alone, this may save your life."

I toss the rock to one side and walk over to her.

"I am sorry," I say crouching down.

She begins to show me a trap that involves identifying the trail, and then removing some dirt along the path.

"See if you can grab a twig that is sturdy enough," she says handing me the twig. She tells me to test the strength of it, and tells me that if it is too light, any animal can snap it. The thing about this is not to be told when an animal is coming, but when a person is.

"Just one," I ask.

"All you need is one to tell you of danger," she says snapping the twig in her hand.

That sound is what brings me back. It is what causes my heart to race. There is someone following me. Trying hard not to show that I heard the snap, I continue to eat the apple that I had in my hand. Going to my backpack, I unzip the flap and there my eyes see the rusty knife that I had place. It is only a couple of inches away from my hand. I know that I had placed the twig in thirty feet and then another at twenty feet. The thing is that I don't know if whoever is out there; snap the first or the second. I could have a couple of minutes or a couple of seconds before they realize that I know they are out there.

I can feel the anticipation growing in my heart, and the heat beat racing in my chest. There are beads of sweat that have now rolled down my back, as I make a mental countdown to reach the knife.

Just as I am reaching for it, I hear a voice.

"Don't do it. You are surrounded."

Turning around I see her there. The first thing that I notice is the dark black hair. It isn't like your typical black, but it is a deeper color that looks a little out of place here in the Wilds. The eyes though, look like she has been here for years, the deep bright green eyes. She grips a knife in her right hand as she walks slowly towards me.

I look around and see no one else, so I tighten my hand around the knife in the pack. The pack falls to the ground and in my left hand is the knife.

"Surrounded?" I say with a hint of disbelief.

She half turns her head, and makes a sound.

"Coo-ee!"

Then a response from the others and then I hear the click of a safety. It is then like shadows they all appear and the amount of people that come from behind the trees it is almost if the entire camp came.

"Drop it," a woman says, "slowly."

I slowly crouch and let the knife fall to the ground. As I straighten up, one approaches me with a rifle pointed. The woman is a big woman, short hair, big muscular shoulders. The way she speaks with a low voice and with such force, and I know that she may be the leader of the group.

"Hands up," she says sharply, which I do.

"Now the question is, how did you find this place, and what are you doing here," she says.

My mind goes blank. It was the one thing that Grandpa Joe told me to say when I made it to the camp. It was the one thing that I should have remembered. I look around and everyone is looking for any reason just to fire.

The person who asked me the question begins to walk towards me. Closing my eyes, I try to remember that moment when Grandpa Joe told me what to say. He told me that it was important, that they would know what it meant. The words come like the whispers of the wind. It comes to my mind in an image, free and without hesitation.

"Trojan horse," I say lowly.

"What?" the person asks moving forward to hear.

"Trojan horse," I repeat louder.

She looks at me, and finally lifts her hand up, and motions everyone to lower their guns.

"You sure," she asks.

I don't even know what it means. It could be that I am saying the wrong thing. Why didn't I ask Grandpa Joe what that meant?

"Yes," I say.

She finally comes over to me, and places a hand on my shoulder.

"Well come on, the next window is in three days. We have to work fast if we are going to do it right," he says.

I am led through the dense brush for a couple of minutes. Finally making it to the camp of the rebellion, I look around and see that most of the people there are kids my own age. There are some adults that are watching over some of the kids, and others that are just sitting there watching us walk back. Many of their eyes are the same as those back in my community. Their eyes are of those who have seen the nightmares of their lives before.

There is a house that looks like it has been there forever. We walk through it and finally they take me to a room. Only the girl with the black hair and from what I believe is the leader walk through a room. She closes the door and there is a table and two chairs.

"Sit," the leader tell me.

I sit on the chair, and the girl hands me a cup of water. Looking at it for a couple of minutes, I look at their eyes and finally take a sip.

"So you want to join," she asks. "We are establishing a base in Portland, which is where you will be going."

She paces a little bit, and then finally looks at me.

"The family on James Street," she starts to say looking at the girl. "He could look like he is related to them."

Turning to me now, she looks at me. "You understand that once you leave here, you will be inside. You would have to walk like them, talk like them, be like them. Your job is to stay there, you cannot come back out. For however long it takes you will be in the prison that we have all fought to leave. You understand that?"

I nod.

"Now the question is why," she asks. "No crap, just the truth."

"My father," I say. "He stayed behind."

She crosses her arms and lowers her head.

"The past is dead," she says looking at me straight in the eyes. It is that thought that I cannot accept. If I accept that, then why go in, why do this?

"The quicker you realize that and accept it," she says. "The easier your life becomes."

She turns to the girl.

"You hear me," she says. "You have to let it go."

The girl with the black hair, face turns like a stone, with no emotions. You can tell that she like me has been fighting this thought. She is probably two to three years older than me, but the way she looks at him, it is almost as if she had lived the life of someone who is double her years.

"You have different priorities now," she says.

She turns around and walks out. I turn and look at her, to see her reaction. There is no reaction; there is no hint of remorse. There are no emotions, there is nothing. She could be Christine's age, probably in her twenties.

"It is hard to come to terms that everything and everyone that you left behind, is gone," she says. "We have lost a lot of people, the pain that we feel, they will tell us, that it is because of some disease. That is why."

He walks over to me. Now he is only a couple of inches away from me.

"That is why, we fight, because the people that we lost, the pain we feel…what we feel, cannot be cured, their memory cannot be taken away with some procedure," he says. "The people that I fight for are the ones that I lost."

He motions and tells me that the girl, will be the one to prep me. I stand and walk outside, and see that she is waiting for me. In front of her feet is my pack. She tosses it to me and I walk next to her.

"You sleep there" she says pointing at a nearby tent.

"Alex," I say.

"You leave in two days," she says as she walks away. Another girl comes to her and whispers something in her ear. They both start to walk towards the nearby tent. She takes two steps and stops. Without turning around she says.

"Alex, welcome to the rebellion."

Walking into the nearby tent, I find a sleeping bag and a bowl. Sitting on the ground, I open the backpack and find the book that I had stuffed before I left. I really don't know why I took it, but I guess I just wanted to remember them, remember where I came from.

'Sleeping Beauty by Charles Perrault'

Opening it, I can remember when I was five or so, and Christine read it to me. The story of a princess that has fallen asleep and only the kiss of a prince could wake her up. The children of the prince and princess being L'Aurore and Le Jour, which of course I thought was the silliest of names. Christine told me that it was French for Dawn and Day and that it was symbol that the children of something bad will always cause a new day with a new dawn of the sun.

"You know that moment right before the sun is about to rise?" she says to me that day. "There is a small moment where everything just stops and even the colors of the dark night and the day sun mix and all you get are the color…"

"Gray," I say to her smiling.

It is that thought that although something bad happened, the dawn of a new day would make it okay. It was that thought that although we lived in the Wilds, in a trailer, with little to no food, we had the possibility that sooner or later everything can change for good.

Lying down on the sleeping bag, all I can do close my eyes and think of them. I wonder if she would understand that I had to leave, that I had to find out whether he was dead or not. The sun is setting and all I can hear is the quiet of the Wilds, just outside the camp. The crickets sing their song in the night, and in the distance you can hear the owl hooting.

There is something though that I hear that I wasn't expecting. It is the crying of a small child.

"Children," I say to myself. "Out here? In the rebel's camp?"

I open slowly the flap of the tent and see that the tent that she was walking to have a lamp on. It is then that I see her come out of her tent. She is holding something that I cannot make out. It seems like she is holding a baby. I try and dismiss this, because she cannot be probably one or two years older than me. She is trying to console her in her arms but is having a hard time doing so.

I stand and grabbing the book I walk outside the tent.

She gives me a glare that only a protective mother could give.

"Here," I say handing her the book.

She cranes her eyes to the book and looks away.

"That won't help," she says.

"Can I," I say signaling at the book. "My mother…she read it to me when I was young."

The baby cannot be more than one or probably two years old. The golden blonde hair beautiful in the night sky, with the exception of her crying, she is beautiful.

She opens her eyes as if to say, 'well?' so open the book and begin to read.

"Once upon a time there lived a king and queen who were grieved, more grieved than words can tell, because they had no children. They tried the waters of every country, made vows, and pilgrimages, and did everything that could be done, but without result. At last, however, the queen found that her wishes were fulfilled, and in due course she gave birth to a daughter."

I can hear the baby cry lessen and although I am sure that she doesn't really understand the words that I am saying, her eyes are focused on me.

"A grand christening was held, and all the fairies that could be found in the realm (they numbered seven in all) were invited to be godmothers to the little princess. This was done so that by means of the gifts which each in turn would bestow upon her (in accordance with the fairy custom of those days) the princess might be endowed with every imaginable perfection."

The silence breaks the reading and I look up to see that she had closed her eyes and had gone to sleep while I read. Looking at her, so peaceful and still, she almost doesn't look real.

I close the book, and hand it to her.

"Just in case," I say walking back to my tent.

Once inside I slide underneath my sleeping bag, place my backpack as my pillow and close my eyes. The rest of the story plays in my head, with the voice of Christine reading it out to me. I have read that story so many times that I know it by heart.


	4. Chapter 4

four

There is a jolt to my sleeping bag.

"Wake up sleeping beauty," someone says.

My eyes have a hard time focusing so I rub them with my hands. Once she comes into focus, all I can see is the same hard expression that welcomed me back in the Wilds. She is dressed and seems to be ready to go.

"What time is it?" I say groggy.

"It is time to go," she says.

Standing up, I look at her confused. The leader of the rebellion told me that it would take two days to get me ready. Could it be that I did something wrong, that I am no longer welcomed.

"Where?" I ask.

"To your assignment," she says coldly. "Five minutes, I will wait for you outside."

Looking around, I examine that the small tent. There is room only for probably one or two people. The holes have been patched and then the patches have patches on top of them. It seems that this is a very old tent that has been used and re-used. Standing up, I stretch and find that my neck has this sore feeling. I pick up my bag and walk outside and see that the sun hasn't even appeared through the trees yet.

She is already there waiting for me with her bag on her shoulders.

"Where are we going," I say.

She immediately puts up her finger to her mouth and motions to me to follow her. She clicks on a flashlight and enters into the darkness. Walking through the trees in night is difficult enough, but when she walks, she walks fast and with a purpose. It is hard to keep up with her, the light is steady and not bouncy like I would expect. It is almost thirty minutes of this, when finally I cry out.

"Hey, wait a minute."

The light stops and then turns around. Walking back, I can hear her footsteps. The beam is then shined on me, blinding me for a couple of seconds. I put up my hand to shield the beam from my eyes. Looking down all I can see is her feet as she comes next to me.

"Can't afford to stop," she says. "If we are going to get to the place."

Breathing hard through my mouth, I am not built to be trekking fast through the Wilds, especially through the night sky. Taking a dry gulp of air, I look at her.

"Where are we going?"

Confused she shakes her head. Crossing her arms she just stands there looking at me. The sunlight is beginning to come out.

"The fence," she says.

She turns and begins to walk again. It is the thought that we are heading for the fence. The one thing that divides everything that I had ever known and the unknown, it is that thought that frightens me. What if, he is no longer…

Shaking my head, I can't go there. The dark paths that cross in front of my mind I have to push aside. There has to be some sort of light. Just like the light that is creeping through the branches and the leaves. The colors of the day begin to fade into picture. The trees no longer look black, but an almost burnt grey color.

I can still see her ahead of me, probably a good ten to fifteen feet. It is then that I see her pause and duck down. She turns back and motions that I do the same. I duck but continue to edge forward little bit little. Something causes my ears to perk up. It is the same thing that probably caused the girl from the rebel camp to suddenly come to a complete stop. To make her come to be a complete statue, it is the noise of someone talking in the distance. If I didn't know she was there I would have never noticed her.

Finally getting to her, I see what she had been staring at for the last ten minutes. There about twenty feet ahead of us, through the bushes is a chain linked fence. It is probably a good fifteen feet from botGabriel to top. I can hear the voices of two men speaking, but cannot tell what they are saying. It seems like one of the men is picking something up from a small shed near the opening of the fence.

There is a slight rumbling. Looking down I see the ground starts to vibrate ever so lightly. The girl from the camp places her ear to the ground and for a moment I can see her eyes. The vibration in my knees grows a little bit stronger so I place my hands on the ground.

"What is it?" I whisper to her as I believe that she will know.

Her eyes connect with mines. It is there that she lifts her head and moves a little bit, moving a branch ever so lightly. She turns to the pack and opens the flap. Fumbling through the items inside the backpack she hands me a piece of paper.

I go to put it in my backpack but she grabs my wrist, and looks at me with a level of intensity that I have never seen.

"You can't take it," she says. "You will have to memorize it."

"Why?" I say.

"Because if you don't make, it and I am pretty sure you won't," she says coldly. "I want to make sure that you do not endanger one of our people inside."

She let's goes of my wrist. I rub my wrist with my hand and can feel the blood coming back to my hand. Looking at her, I can see that she means what she said. It is her experience that I will fail to make it in. So why even know my contact inside?

She turns from me and then looks back out towards the fence.

"Oh and you have about hmm, two minutes to do it," she says looking back at me. "The truck is coming is and if you do not time it just right, you won't make it."

I open the paper and quickly examine it, quickly try and remember it. There are numbers and words, names and a date. There is a sentence that I don't understand. Why do people talk in code, when if you are straight with them, there is no room for confusion. It really doesn't matter; I am really not part of the rebellion anyways. She knows that, hence the reason why she doesn't even tells me her name. It is why she led me through the night, through twists and turns, so that I won't be able to get back. It was the wrong answer, why I am going into Portland, but it was the honest one.

Once I close the paper I hand it back to her. And look at the coming truck. It seems to be a supply truck. The rattling has gotten so loud that I can hear the brakes squeal as they are applied. The sun has already made its appearance so the time is now. Placing my backpack on my shoulders, I look at her and then finally we both exchange a nod and like that we say our goodbyes.

It is an instant. It happens so quick that I all I can do is act on instinct. I wonder how it is that although I have never done anything like this, my movements are all calculated. She picks up a rock turns, stand and throws it at one of the spot lights. The crack in the glass causes the lights to burst and all I see is her turning to me and mouthing the words.

"Go"

We both turn and I make a break for the truck as the guards make their way to the broken spot light. The truck is probably a good twenty feet in front of me, and as I approach from behind the truck I make sure to keep myself low and away from the mirrors of the truck. The commotion at the fence is few but the distraction does work. As I make it to the truck, I look for a way to get into the back of the truck. The back latch is locked, and I quickly look to the left and right to see if anyone is coming.

There is no way in, I think to myself. I can feel the sweat on my palms and my heart begins to race. They are coming back and I am out in the open. As soon as they reach the truck I am a goner. There is only one thing, only one place that I can hide. Getting on my knees I look underneath the truck. The heat from the muffler blowing, more than likely extremely hot, depends on how long the truck has been on the road. There is no other choice, so lie on the ground and inch my way up to one side of the truck, keep myself away from the muffler.

Once I find an area that I can lift myself off the ground, I unbuckle my belt and wrap it around the metal bar.

"Open the back," I hear someone says. Looking to the ground I see the gravel move and can see the feet moving quickly. The driver opens the door and walks to the back of the truck, opening the back.

"Nothing," the same sound says. "Okay you have been cleared."

"Finally, I am already late for my deliveries," he says. Walking alongside the truck I see that the guard shiny new boots stop and all I can do is close my eyes and pull myself higher into the truck.

I jerk back from the tail pipe that has grazed my calf and know that the burn will be severe.

"Okay," finally I hear. "You are good to continue."

I slowly lower myself slightly and can feel the pain on my calf. The whole truck rattles and begins to move forward. Closing my eyes I feel the bumps of the gate and finally the truck begins to move quicker. The wind underneath the truck cools my sweat that has begun to pool around my lower back. I can't help but to smile along the ride, as relief finally hits me.

I am inside.

The truck begins to slow down and I think to myself that I would have to unlatch myself. Placing my hands around the belt I finally get myself ready to drop. The screeching sound of the brakes lets me know that we will be coming to a complete stop.

I unlatch myself and hold onto the metal bar. Turning my head I see the asphalt finally slowing and then finally coming into focus as the truck stops.

I let go gradually, and then looking up I don't see anything, and looking down, I don't see any other car. The truck begins to shake and then start to move without me. I just lie there on the asphalt letting the truck go. Once the bumper passes my face, I look up at the sky and then see the clouds. Sitting up on the asphalt I look around and the street sign.

'Forest Avenue.'

Standing I look left and right. No cars, and no one really walking outside, the houses around me look deserted almost as if they had been abandoned for years. Walking I feel the searing pain of the burn and instead of walking I gingerly limp along the sidewalk. All I can see are red _X's _on the door of the houses. Coming to a corner I close my eyes and imagine myself reading the folded piece of paper.

'If you walk along the forest you will be able to read the signs to the corner of the two seas.'

So all I can do is walk, along Forest Avenue, until I am able to read some sort of sign. What sign, honestly I don't know. I see a nearby small river and walk to it, cleaning my face and letting the cool water help take away the pain of the burn. The day is beginning and I have to hurry before the police or the guards find me.

I quicken the pace and when I duck into an alley way I see the next streets name.

"Read Street"

I can't help but smile at the play on words that was in the note. I turn into Read Street and walk until I see Canco Road, but no seas. If there is a place on words with Read Street, probably there is a place on words on the three seas, and it means two "Cs."

Left or right?

On the stop sign I see a small smudge of blue paint on the right hand side of the sign. Could it be that that is the sign to get me to the place that I am suppose to go. The only things that I could do at this time, is not question but trust, and have faith that it will lead me to the correct place.

Turning right, I walk through the Canco Road and walking a couple of blocks I come to the corner of Canco Road and Carlyle Road, or the two "Cs." There is no one there. It is an empty lot. No house, no one to welcome me, only an empty bus bench. So now what?

I sit down on the bus bench and look to the left and right. Then without any movement I see a man approaching the corner. Walking with a box in his hand he sits down next to me. There is no talking; only silence, that is until the voice says.

"He who jumps may fall."

I turn and look at him.

"But he may also fly."

He looks up at the sky and sees a bird land on the branch of the nearby tree. The bird just sings a couple of notes and then moves away flapping it wings and soaring up into the sky. He lets out a deep sigh and stands.

"You have a name?" he asks.

"Alex," I say. "Alex Sheathes."

He smiles just a little bit nods.

"Nice to meet you," he says.

Turning he begins to walk back down the same street. I stand and begin walk behind him. There is no one yet on the streets, the blinds are all drawn shut. Sort of reminds me of back home in the community, every curtain, every shutter, ever blind shut to keep people from knowing where we live, how we live, who we live with. Could it be that although many if not all of those who were back in the community escaped from these places, but really did they escape their mentality of it.

He picks up the pace and finally we stop at an old house. There are some lights on and he places a hand on my back and pushes me towards the door. The house is old and in desperate need of some repair. The shutters of the window are a faded blueish color and as I approach the house. There is one thing that causes me to smile through the searing pain of the burn, through the tired feeling of not eating that I felt running through the Wilds this morning. The little bit of joy that I feel that although I had to go through all of that, I made it when the girl from rebellion said that I wouldn't. What I would love to get to see the expression on her face. I proved her wrong.

The door opens and I see her with a towel in her hands. She is drying her hands, probably from washing something. Her hair is curly and soft golden color. Her smile is something that I just look at. It is soft and reassuring. She holds the towel with one hand and with the other she extends it to me.

It is a moment of uncertainty. Who is this woman that welcomes me in her home? Who is this man behind me who places his hand on my shoulder?

"Come," she says. "We have much to talk about."

I slowly extend my hand and feel the cool hand in mine. Walking into the house, I hear the door close and then I am led to a room with sofas. We walk around and finally sit on the sofa.

"I will get you some water," the man says walking into the other room.

"I know you must have many questions," she begins. "But let's start with our names."

She lets go of my hand and then I see the man walk back with two glasses of water. He places one on the table in front of me, and the other he hands to the woman.

"I am Beatrice," she says softly. "This is Gabriel."

"I am Alex," I say.

She looks at me and then to Gabriel.

"Alex, are you hungry?" she asks.

I shake my head and she smiles looking at Gabriel, he walks into the kitchen. I can hear the clinking of a plate, and the scraping of a spoon.

"So," she says waiting for me.

"Are you with the rebellion?" I ask.

She looks at me and then stands, walking over to the window and makes sure that the blinds are closed. She parts it slowly and then closes them again. Walking over to a desk she grabs a stack of paper, the metal waste basket and a lighter.

"Do you like books?" she asks shaking her head up and down or side to side.

What an odd response to a question that I made. From the way she looks at me, I know that she is serious, seeing how her face has become a couple shades whiter. It looks like she is nervous as she makes her way back to the sofa.

I nod my head yes that I like books.

Placing the metal waste basket on the ground, she grabs a paper, and a pencil. She scribbles something on a piece of paper and then finally hands it to me. Reading the paper it says clearly.

"Never mention the rebellion, or else we are dead."


	5. Chapter 5

five

Duration in Trojan horse: Three years

Flicking on and off the lighter I stare at the fire. It is the one thing that I remember from all those years ago. The first day that I was in Gabriel and Beatrice's house, the papers that we burned and how the fire just consumed them all. Paranoia is something that I guess you just get use to, when you are under a false identity. It took me years to understand that that I had to be someone else that I couldn't be myself.

I pick up the piece of paper that I had placed a couple of minutes ago.

"The one thing that I am truly afraid of, the hidden fear of me is that love will never be enough, that my love would never be enough."

The loops and the tracing of the cursive writing that Beatrice had shown me a while back, is beautiful in its own form. With my finger I trace the loops of the words. I click open the lighter and flick the wheel. The sparks fly and I see the fire being birthed through it all. The tip of the paper is caught by the fire and just like that, it travels through the paper destroying the time it took to think of what to write. It destroys the time it took to get through the fear of putting it to paper. It does not hold back as it consumes nearly everything, the time it took to write it down. Finally placing the remaining piece of paper in the tin can I see it finally consume the very thought of my heart, there in a small tin can.

The memory still haunts me, the beating of my heart, and the splashing of the water under my feet as I ran home from school in the rain, knowing that something was wrong.

Running as hard as I could, and getting to the house as quick as I could. But it didn't matter; the words still stop me, still break me, and still cause my heart to ache. I was only fifteen, I had only been in their house for a couple of months.

"I am so sorry Alex. We just heard that from our contact in C.O.R.E. that William Sheathes died."

Her eyes filled with restrained tears as she crumbles the piece of paper and puts it to the match. It was that feeling, that all this was for nothing, that he was alive somewhere and we didn't know where.

"I have to see it for myself," I remembering telling her. I sit there meeting her eyes that now look at me with worry. It is odd, but the way she looks at me almost resembles the way a mother would look at her child. We have grown close, these last years, her teaching me of live in the fences, where everyone as she would put it, is sleep walking. I would tell her about live outside, where everything was so free. Of course we would talk in written communication only to burn it at the end. The ash is the only thing that I can remember having to throw out to the sky. How even then, it is as free as the words that were once written on it.

The fire and the ash.

It is all that reminds me of that day. The fire and the ash.

I swirl the can filled with ashes and walk up to the open window. Turning the can I see the ash catch the wind and then fly out to the sky. Staring out at the clouds and the sky, all I think about is my life back three years ago. The birds I see come over and land on a tree, sings a pretty song in the morning, and then when done, flies away back into the Wilds, back to the place where there are no rules, no walls, no peering eyes trying to find something that never had existed.

I turn my wrist to see my watch and see that I have thirty minutes to get to my shift. I grab my backpack and jump down the stairs running past the broken steps and the creaking and crackling of the stair case. Once I am at front windows of the living room, I move the loose wooden board and slip through it. There on the grass I pick up the old rusted up bike and begin to pump as quickly as I can. I cannot be late today, on the first day of class, the first day of work, they have worked too hard to get me in, to get all the paperwork legitimate.

Today of all days is the first day of class at the University of Portland. The rebels left word that the next phase is to get into the labs. The only way we could have done that was to get into the University of Portland. Only Doctors, researchers, and technicians have jobs at the labs, but they all attended the University of Portland. That is what I am studying to become, a medical technician, since my paperwork are falsified it was the only profession that wouldn't raise any flags.

Go down one block and turn down an alley, zigzagging through the delivery trucks and the people on the sidewalk. This act is the only thing that keeps me sane, it is like running through the Wilds, through the forest. There is no path, but only one destination.

"The only way to find a new path is to get lost on purpose."

It is the things that you learn from the people that are around you that helps you nowadays. These last three years, I had learned so much for Beatrice and from Gabriel. Of course we know nothing of the rebellion's plans or if we are doing anything to help push it along. There are no plans, but only the ones that disrupt small things. The time we placed all the furniture on the roof of the central police station for one, was something that was planned the day of. It showed me that although we may feel that we are alone in this, there are more of us that I had imagine.

Monument square is coming to view and finally smiling that I realize that I am on time. Parking my bike on the nearby rack, I knock on the door of the Grin. Seeing Peter walking coming out of the storage closet, he walks over to the door and unlocks it. Checking his watch he smiles.

"Good, Warren, you are just on time," he says. "Prep the machines; with the first day of class you know we are going to be busy."

Walking behind the counter, I place the backpack underneath and start the prep work of the daily coffee machines. Peter walks out with cups and starts to re-stock all the cups that we are more than likely going to go through. Once done, he starts to straighten out the chairs while I grab the nearby broom and start to sweep under the tables.

"Don't you start class today?" Peter asks.

Looking up I see that he is looking at the schedule on the board.

"Yeah," I say. "Early morning chemistry, and biology, the two classes that are surely to keep me up."

We both look up, and he says.

"Don't tell me you have Henderson," he says.

I nod, and he lets out a laugh. There are stories of Henderson's Chemistry class, and how impossible it is to keep your eyes open. Lots of students drop the class or avoid it at all cost. I on the other hand do not have the luxury of other students.

"You will need this," he says handing me a cup of coffee.

The day goes without incident and when in class the days seems longer and honestly more boring that usual. It isn't until the afternoon when I go back to finish my shift. It is one of those hot sunny afternoons where everyone just mulls around the statute in the center of Monument Square. The statue is on the base of a pedestal, which one can only conclude that on top of the pedestal was another statue that has now fallen and disappeared.

The statue is of a man with an outstretched hand fighting against the wind or the weather or who knows what. The weather has beaten down the statue and even the plaque that once said something is all but faded away. I think the statue probably held a sword pushing forward. Well that is the thought inside of me. Now all that is left is an outstretched hand cupped.

I stop in front of the statue and look down at the plaque. All you can read clearly is the "brave men…who died."

It is a thought of my father the day that I found his plaque. I must have stood in front of the Crypts for what seems like forever. I had to wait years, they would tell me, because they didn't want to draw suspicion. It was the first day that I got to wear my guards uniform, and had my ID given all I could think of is the coming Saturday when I would make my way all the way downtown to the Crypts to see if I could find him. Couldn't even sleep the night before, thinking about what emotions I would feel when I saw his grave, or even if they buried him. The whole bus ride all the way down to the Crypts I just sat there motionless. Once off all I could do is just staring at it. The stone walls that have more walls than windows, looks so ominous.

A guard walking into the Crypts comes back to see if I was okay.

"Yes," I say. "Have an appointment at 3:00 PM and well I was a little bit early."

I hand him my badge and he looks at it.

"Who are you here to see?" He says without looking up.

"Thomas," I say with a sense of calmness to it.

He doesn't look up, he just nods and hands me my badge. Standing he walks over to the gate and opens it. The electronic gate shutters and then finally opens slowly. The screeching of the gate would cause a normal person to flinch and cringe but I had been waiting for this moment for three years. Preparing myself both mentally and emotionally for what I am about to experience.

I walk across the courtyard, whose grass seems to have died, but not from the lack of sun, but from the lack of water or care.

Once I am in front of the two double doors, I hear a click and then push open the doors. Although I am mentally prepared and emotionally prepared, I am nowhere near physically prepared. The smell is so pungent that it nearly causes my body to vomit on its own.

Walking to my right I see a woman behind a desk. Her eyes on the computer screen typing away. As I walk towards her, her eyes slowly moves from the screen to me. I smile to her and I know that from the way she stands, she has some sort of authority here so therefore I will have to get on her good side.

"Hi," I say smiling.

"Yes?" she says. "The gate house says you have an appointment with Thomas?"

I nod yes and can see that her hair is nicely made, and carefully done, almost on purpose. Her nails are painted in a red color and all trimmed. The smile though that I catch is more than likely her perfume and it seems that she had bathed in it. The mixture of the stench of what I believe is human feces, urine, sweat and her perfume is an odd combination.

"What is that lovely fragrance," I say to her.

She smiles and there her eyes light up.

"It is my new perfume...Alex is it?" she says. "You seem so young to be a guard."

"Yes I know, I had always wanted to the first line of defense," I say smiling. "So when a job came up at the Labs loading dock, I immediately applied for it. My dream..."

I look around, opening my arms. "Is to become a guard here, and protect my city. That is why Thomas wanted to show me around. I am so excited."

Hopefully I didn't overdo it; hopefully she feels the same way. The frame of her family picture lets me believe that she values her job; if not there wouldn't be anything about her life outside here.

Just then the sound of a door opening causes both of us to turn to it. She smiles at she makes contact with the person who is walking towards us.

"Thomas," she calls out as he finally makes it to the counter. "This is Alex, and you better show this young man everything."

Handling me a pass, I look at it, and it does not say 'restricted' but 'unrestricted.'

"Don't worry Alice," he says. "I will."

He nods towards the door and we walk silently. When I get to the door, I turn around and I lift my hand in a wave to her. She smiles and lifts up her hand in response.

Once the door closes he turns to me and nods and then I see his eyes tilt up. Looking up I see the camera and know that it is not save talk openly here. The hallway is filled with doors with very small windows.

"So Alex," he says. "The Crypts are divided into Six Wards; one through three is the pysch wards, or how what we call the crazies. You are in Ward One right now."

He jiggles the door handle as we walk.

"Have to make sure that the doors are locked," he says. "Once Bob, the night guard of Ward Three left the door unlocked by mistake and well it was all mayhem."

The way he emphasizes on the word _three_ it is definitely meant for me to remember it.

"So we check them even if we are not from that Ward," he says. "You understand?"

I nod.

"So the other three Wards?" I say.

"The Zombies?" he says. "It is where we keep the more dangerous citizens. The higher the degree, the higher the number of Ward."

"So, Six?" I say.

He shakes his head. "Those are the lifers, the most dangerous."

The word, lifers. The code word that Beatrice told me. It was the code for yes, and zombies were the code for no. It is there that I realize that my father was in Ward Six. We walk through the end of the hallway and then to a courtyard.

"So will we get to see Ward Six," I ask, finally asking the question of would I get to see where he was buried.

"Hmm, don't know, not suppose to," he says. "The lifers are under restriction. The only place truly that I could show you is the courtyard of Ward Six."

He turn and grabs a key, finally making it to the Ward with the big number "6" above it, he sticks it into the lock and turns the key.

He opens the heavy door that seems to be reinforced steel with some difficulty. On the other side of the door is a empty courtyard, much different from the other courtyards. This one has little to no light, and there is no grass but only dirt with rocks all around it.

He walks slowly coming to a stop a third of the way in. Finally stopping, I look down and see him tap his feet three time.

I look down and see it there. A smooth stone.

"This is where the lifers come to an end," he says. "Hey your shoe laces are untied. Kind of dangerous, you might want to tie them before we go."

I look down at the stone, and all I can remember is the stone out in the wild, with the word 'Sheathes' on it. It is the only way that I know that she is buried there. Here there is no way to know, no way to grieve. I bend down and begin to tie my shoe. The tears build behind my eyes and all I can do is tie them as slowly as possible. In a moment I remember that I still had the pen in my hand that I used to sign in.

"You ready?" Thomas asks.

I quickly write a 'W' on it for William.

I must have gone a dozen times to the Crypts to get his full name on the smooth stone. Everyone there now knows me, as the very dedicated guard, who wants to grow up to guard the Crypts.

"Excuse me?" I hear someone ask.

The hot sun fading on my hand. Looking down I see the faded gold plaque in front of the statue of Monument Square. I stand and see a girl looking at me.

"Do you know where the Grind is?" she asks.

I point towards the corner shop where the people are coming in and out of. She thanks me and begins to walk towards the corner coffee shop. I reposition the backpack feeling the heavy books, and the straps digging into my shoulders. Once across the street, I look up and see a bird, a simple white bird sitting on the awing of the coffee shop. It tilts its head and flies across the square toward the statue. My eyes follow the flight path of the bird. It is there that when it hands I see her.

The brown hair jumps up and down, the way the light catches her determined face, her eyes, through the buildings, there is only one word to describe it.

Beautiful.

She makes it to the statue where she jumps and high fives the open hand. The oddest thing happens, she yells out a word to the girl that was running next to her.

"Halena!"

The flash of light off the city bus as it crosses in front of me, blinds me. For a second I close my eyes and then when I open them, and she is gone.


	6. Chapter 6

six

Duration in Trojan horse: Four years

There is a knock, and as I open my eyes, I see the sunrise peek through the blinds and bounce off the grey paint on my room. It is a couple of months into my second semester at the University of Portland. It didn't take much to get through the first year of school. Once you start your second year, you are eligible to move onto the apartments near the University. It wasn't that I didn't like living at home with Beatrice and Gabriel, but it just never felt right. We all knew that, when I became eligible.

Standing up, I look around and find the money I had left under a book. Coming to the door, I place the chain on it, and peek through the peep hole. On the other side, I see the familiar face of Blaine. Opening the door, he opens the backpack.

"You got it?" I ask.

He nods.

"Took me a long time to find, and it wasn't easy," he says. "Why do you want it?"

The tone in his voice sounds like a accusation, sounds almost like he regrets getting it for me.

"The same reason that I found you at the farm," I say.

His eyes go wild and wide as shame washes over his face. He digs into his bag and hands me the package. I hand him the cash and as he puts it in his pocket, he looks at me.

"There is word of another one, in a couple of days," he says. "You going?"

"We will see," I say.

I close the door and then look at the package in the plain brown paper. Ripping it off, I look at it.

'Genesis: A complete History of the World and the Known Universe'

Many people don't realize that before the closing of the borders, before the cure, there were many different societies that wrote differently. Many of us write from left to right, but some I heard back in the dark days, wrote from right to left, and some, some, I heard wrote from top to bottom.

Starting from the back of the book and working my way forward, I see the story of a lost religion that talks about love not as a disease but as a way of life.

Although many students know of forbidden books, not many seek after them; they seek after the hidden music that is not part of LAMM of the Library of Approved Music and Movies. Hackers of the rebellion have been embedding them into the websites of government web pages; anywhere they can find a way to show people of life outside the fences.

If people only knew that everything that is illegal according to government, was placed by the people that they feared the most, I wonder, would they still listen?

The alarm clock starts to ring and I know that if I don't leave now, I will get to my shift late. I stuff the book in the backpack, and put on my uniform; grabbing my badge off the door knob, I run downstairs and outside, almost tripping on my shoe laces. The same bike that I have had for years lies against the bike rack. Removing it from the rack I start to pedal towards the labs.

The labs are in the downtown district, and today is one of four evaluation days for everyone who is under eighteen years old. Boys and Girls come into the labs and get evaluated psychologically, by their behavior and by their likes and dislikes. Those answers are then given to power computers to make matches for them. Five probability matches for procreation. They are then given the cure procedure and the disease of love is removed.

Still the thought that love could be a disease is something that I had never really accepted. I know my mother loved me, and if she died because of it, then she helped me live because of it.

I can see the lines of boys and girls had already begun to line up in front of the entrance of the labs. I make my way to the service road that is behind the labs. In the loading dock I see a truck and I find it confusing. There aren't any scheduled deliveries for today. Especially today. Security is heightened on evaluation days, and there is protocol that no deliveries on those scheduled days.

Getting to the loading dock, I see Sal there signing for a delivery.

"Hey Warren," he says.

"A delivery on evaluation day?" I say out loud.

"I know," he says. "Weird, but it comes from the Revere institute, something to do with new evaluation protocol."

Revere institute? That is the code word for a message, something to do with Paul Revere. The rebels are going to be making a demonstration.

"Do you need any help?" I ask.

He waves me off saying that he is okay, that it is only four crates with instructions to open them at a specific time.

"How about some coffee," I say. "I could always go to the C complex to get it."

He lifts his head up. We are suppose to be at our post during evaluation day and even when it is not, we are not suppose to be wandering through the labs.

"The good kind…from the umm…second floor?" He asks with the smile.

"Alright," I say walking towards the guard hut. I drop my backpack there, to avoid any suspicion. Putting on my badge around my neck, I walk into the hallways of the research labs. The labs are shaped into a crescent moon with one long hallway connecting each complex. Complex A, is part of the research, where the cure is stored. Complex B and C are where the evaluations are done. Complex D and E are the offices of the scientists.

Walking upstairs I go to the coffee machine. Turning left and right down the hallway. All the scientists are downstairs in Complex B and C giving the examinations. I had always wondered how the examinations are done. Turning on the machine, I put the timer on and walk toward one of the observation decks.

In complex B and C there are two large examination rooms. They have observation decks for students who are studying to become scientists. They are researchers, psychologist and even some medical doctors.

Opening the door, I walk inside quietly closing the door. There I hear the scientists had already begun an examination.

"What are some of your favorite books," one of the scientist asks.

Closing my eyes, I imagine the books in the trailer of the community. I start to silently mouth off my favorite books.

_Famous Love Poetry, The Sleeping Beauty in the Woods by Charles Perrault, and…Romeo and Juliet._

The last one matches the voice from downstairs. Odd. I say to myself as I think I recognize the voice. I slink down to my knees and walk slowly towards the edge of the railing.

"And why is that?" a question from one of the scientist.

It is silence. Something that I have not yet come to expect, the silence of thought. If someone had asked me why those books where my favorite, it would probably take me a while to give a reason.

As I make it to the railing, I see her there, a shy girl there in the lights. It is almost as if I recognize her. Her voice is trembling as she finally answers.

"It's beautiful."

I cannot believe it. Someone who in this zombie town, believes that Romeo and Juliet is beautiful. No one believes it is beautiful but people who believe in love. Looking a little bit more closely, I cannot see her face, but just the nervousness from behind her. I have to see her face.

"Beautiful?" One asks, and pauses. "That's an interesting word to use. Very interesting. Perhaps you find suffering beautiful? Perhaps you enjoy violence?"

She stumbles to recover. I slowly make my way around the observation deck trying to get to see her face.

"No, no, that's not it." She stumbles out. "I just mean...there's something so sad about it…"

The frustration on the voice of one of scientist and I know that the responses are not what the cookie cutter responses are suppose to be. I am almost there and I hear the next question.

"Tell us something simple. Like your favorite color, for example."

It is going to be something like blue or green, something safe. Something that is going to be like all these people, safe. I smile when I finally see her face and remember that it is the same girl that I saw that day almost a year ago. I must have gone to that same spot at that same time, almost for a month straight and never saw her again. I even placed a small piece of paper in the statue thinking that she might catch it as she high fives the statue. I find myself just looking at her for no reason whatsoever.

She blurts out her favorite color.

"Grey!"

It jolts me back. It brings me to the days of Sleeping Beauty of L'Aurore and Le Jour, for Dawn and Day. The time before the sun would rise, and the dawn would catch the day. There is the color of grey. The beautiful color of something new.

I hear a soft rumbling outside and walk towards the door out of the observation deck. Opening the door I look down the hallway and see nothing. Coming back into the observation deck, I hear her response.

"…right before the sun rises there's a moment when the whole sky goes this pale nothing color - not really gray but sort of, or sort of white, and I've always really liked it because it reminds me of waiting for something good to happen."

Just then I hear the sound of a stomping kind coming closer and closer. Finally the door bursts open and I see cows. The shock on their looks, the way they all scream and jump on the table. It causes me to laugh over the screams. They certainly were not waiting for this to happen. Definitely nothing good for them, but hilarious for me.

Just then I look down and see that she is looking at me. Our eyes connect and in that second all I can do is smile and wink. The alarm starts to blare and I know that I only have a couple of minutes to get back downstairs to the docks.

Running out of the observation deck, I run down the steps and finally see the regulators coming from the docks along with the police. I immediately go to the research labs of Complex A, and there I pretend that I am locking all the doors.

It is then that I hear it.

"Hey, you," a gruff voice calls out.

Turning around, I call out to him. "Check the other doors."

He looks at me confused.

"What code is it?" I say in a panic look.

"Code?" he repeats.

"Yes, what code is it," I say. "If I knew what was going on, then I can follow the protocol. Like if we were under an attack states then we are supposed to lock every door that has valuable items. The cure is the most valuable so I ran over here when I heard the alarm."

He motions to me to follow him.

"Come with me," he says.

I walk with him, acting confused, knowing full well that it was a message from the rebels. They take me to a holding room and there I see Sal handcuffed.

"Sal," I say. "Are you okay?"

He seems pretty out of it. After about an hour or so, the door opens and I see the regulator come and tell me to come with them. I walk out and into another smaller room.

"Sit," he says.

I sit and he sitting in front of me, he asks me to go detail by detail on what I did when I was on site. I told him that all I did was come in, and see that Sal was signing for some delivery. Then when he asked me to go get some coffee from Complex C, I went upstairs got the coffee and came back downstairs.

"By then everything was going crazy, and all I could think of was to protect the cure," I say.

He writes down everything. After he makes me sign my statement he tells me to make sure that I stick to my zones. I nod and he opens the door letting me go. They tell me that with the whole confusion, the cows that were suppose to go to the slaughter house, ended up at the labs. That Sal should have checked the packages more carefully. No one bothers to notice that on evaluation day there shouldn't have been any deliveries.

Riding back to the apartments, all I can think of is that my cover was almost blown. That I had to sacrifice someone who didn't know anything, so that I wasn't found out. What will happen to Sal, I wonder. Will they just think that he was an idiot, or will they read into the fact that he told me to go and get coffee.

"Remember," he says. "Stay the course."

It was what Gabriel told me the day I left. They struggled with it, saying that it was safer for me to stay in the house. I of course wanted out from the moment I realized that my father was gone. It was after all the real reason why I came to Portland. Now I am just stuck here. It was weird that day, though. Gabriel who really never was affectionate, embraced me so closely that I honestly forgot why I came to Portland and I almost began to allow my heart to believe that there were people in this world that actually cared for me. It was the day that I couldn't help but allow myself to cry just a little bit. Although I told them both that it was the allergies, we all smiled.

"Remember, stay the course."

It was our code, to remember why we are here. It was to remind ourselves that we are fighting for something more than against ignorance, but that we are fighting for our right to be free. Grabbing a box, and the suitcase, I walk towards the nearest bus stop.

Beatrice walks alongside me to the stop. Her hands folded on her lap as she walked quietly. Once we are there, she looks at me, and then fixes my collar. It is one of the things that she is allowed to do, that won't raise suspicion.

"There," she says softly. "Now you look respectable."

I smile.

"I put a sandwich in your bag," she says.

"Thank you," I say smiling.

"Don't give up," she says.

It causes me to look at her. She hardly ever talks about the rebellion, or the cause so openly like this. It is much too dangerous, so I turn and look around; making sure that no one is actually walking by, or even listening to us.

"Stay the course," I repeat.

She shakes her head no. The bus is coming up to the stop and I pick up the box. She leans in and whispers in my ear.

"Sometimes, some things, or some ones are more important than the course," she says smiling. "Don't stop looking."

The doors open and I get on the bus. Looking back through the windows I see her lift up her hand.

The water drops on my head awakens me from the stupor that I was in. Looking up I see the dark clouds had formed and the rain has begun to fall. Walking over to the bike I dig into my pocket and remove the keys to the lock. I wrap the chain around the frame of the bike and slinging my backpack; I get on the pedals and begin to pedal up the street.

The dots of rain fill my vision, and all I can do is smile and close my eyes for a small fraction. The images still fresh in my mind, the untamed word of the grey coming from her mouth. The look of surprise of her eyes as we made contact. The way her hands rubbed together through each of the answers, nervous and unsure, but still confident in herself.

Once in front of the apartments, I don't know I feel that I belong there. My hair dripping with rain now, lands in my eyes, and I can do is move it away with my hands. It isn't a rain that bothers, but it is a rain that refreshes. I always loved the rain, it reminds me of the trailer. You couldn't do anything when it rained, so we would stay inside and read under the candle light. The rhythmic sound of the rain drops on the tin surface, I don't know but as a child it was a safe sound.

"You hear that?" Christine says pointing up.

I look up to where she is pointing, and give a shrug.

"What? The rain?" I say.

"It is the sound of a second chance," she says. "It was that although it looks dark, and unforgiving, the rain cleans everything, even the air feels cleaner. It is like the world knows that we all need a second chance."

Walking up to the house in the Deering Highlands, I hear the squishing noise of the rain soaked shoes as I walk on the creaking old wood floors. Counting the doors on the first floor, I knock along the wall, until I find the hollow patch. Removing the panels I take out the bag and open it.

Change of clothes, and can food.

I walk over to the fireplace and with the lighter that I have in my pocket, I take out a couple of sheets of paper. Examining it, the writings, the thoughts, and know that it is only for me, but one day, one day I hope to share them with someone.

I flick on the lighter, and can see her eyes. Placing the burning paper, I see it slowly catch the dry wood. It is there that I rub my hands on the warm fire. I slip off the shoes and place them near the fire so that the heat can begin to dry the soak shoes. The nearby pot I empty out and taking off my clothes I begin to twist the water off

The fire is warm and I can feel the protection that it brings. It is there that I lie down and with my uniform hung on the lines near the fire, I open the can of beans and begin to eat it from the can.

The rain will clean everything, and tomorrow will be a new day. The rain cleans, and changes everything.


	7. Chapter 7

seven

Duration in Trojan horse: Four years

The rain and the thunder keep me frozen in my mind. I know full well that what I am experiencing isn't real, it is only a dream. It is the thought that it is the only way to see her. I keep myself from waking up. The rain feels so real, and the thunder shakes the inner core of my inside.

Looking down all I see is the church with the small the metal gate. I never knew her, and well today, I guess I wish that I did. Both of them, gone. It is then that I feel it, a jolt of someone trying to wake me up.

I stumble backwards and see her there in front of me. It takes a couple of minutes for my eyes to focus but then when it does, I see her there.

"Hey, hey, Alex" she says softly. "It is me, Beatrice."

It is an odd thing seeing her here. There was only one other time when she was here. She caught me once a long time ago, when I ditched school to come to the Highlands. She yelled at me for drawing attention to myself by cutting class. It wasn't what I was supposed to do, it wasn't part of the plan. I still remember what she told me that day.

"What?" I say sternly.

"You simply cannot bring attention to yourself," she says. "It is dangerous, not just to you."

The implication that the regulators would care about a kid acting up, or ditching school is enough to make me laugh. I do however hold it in, out of respect for her.

"I really don't think that the regulators would red flag someone who ditches school," I say lightly. She looks at me with a stern face, and I know that she is insulted by it. It wasn't really my intention for her to find out. I just couldn't do it anymore. Stuck in class, listening to the manipulative drivel come out of Ms. Thompson's mouth, about the cure, and about how great life is now.

"You know you being here is a privilege," she says softly. "Although you might not believe it. Life out there, is not all that is cracked up to be."

Turning away from the window, I look at her, confused, and angry.

"Seriously?" I say. "A privilege? A privilege to have to pretend to be likes everyone else, walking around like there is nothing inside them anymore. The walking dead? You wouldn't understand."

Turning from her, how could she understand it, all she knows is living inside this hell.

"Everyday on the way home," she says. "I would stare at the sunsets over the harbor, dreaming of a life outside."

It is too much, to have to pretend like everything is okay, like nothing hurts, like we are all the same. At first when I had a goal, it was okay, I knew what I was signing up for. Now that everything has gone to crap, what is left? The plan? The rebellion?

"I just couldn't do it today, put on the mask, and pretend to be someone I am not. This house…is me," I say softly. "Like dying on the inside. Fighting the darkness, that is slowly winning."

I feel her hand on my shoulder. Holding my tears in, feeling the emptiness of this house, it is why I spend most of my time here. It reminds me of home; it reminds me of life outside the fence.

"How do you do it?" I say.

She grabs a nearby bowl, and crumples up a piece of paper.

"The lighter you stole?" she asks with her hand sticking out.

I stick my hand into my pocket and placing it in her hand; I tell her that I am sorry about taking the lighter which she just smiles and takes the lighter.

"Listen," she says placing the bowl on the ground. "A single spark from the lighter can cause this paper here to burn. However…"

She walks over and grabs a plate.

"If you were to take out the oxygen," she says placing the plate over the bowl. "It doesn't matter how intense the fire may start, it will be snuffed out."

Removing the plate she shows me that the fire has been put out and the paper had survived.

"You understand?" she says. "You have to find something that gives you the ability to breathe. For me it was the ability to see the sunsets on the way home."

It was always the simple things that I miss from my time living with Beatrice and Gabriel. We became a family, and understood each other, the necessities that we each had. That is why I guess that I see Beatrice now standing in front of me.

"What's wrong?" I say finally standing up. "Is Gabe okay?"

She smiles.

"Yes, yes, we are okay," she says. "We saw the stunt on the television with the cows, and wanted to make sure you were okay."

I nod, and she embraces me for a small moment. Just like a mother, she looks at me for a couple of minutes.

"Why wasn't I told?" I say. "A friend of mines was taken into custody."

She stands there unsure, of how to respond. I can tell from the way she looks at me, that she doesn't know. It is how it has been lately, no information, no instructions, always running on instincts. Could it be that the rebellion is not as organized as we had hoped? They had always told us that there are a lot more than of us here in the city that we thought. It was the whole idea of the Trojan horse.

It was a war back in the banned history books, where it looked they had surrendered. They offered a gift, a wooden horse, that unbeknown to them, was filled with soldiers just waiting inside. That is who we are, hidden inside the horse, waiting for the right time to come out.

"Don't know," she says. "But thank goodness, you weren't caught."

Looking down at my watch, I see that it is almost time for my shift.

"Almost time for me to go on shift," I say.

She looks around and then finally places her hand on my cheek.

"Be careful," she says.

I nod, and she walks outside the house, towards the nearest bus station. It was the weirdest feeling, the feeling of being worried about me. I grab the clean white t-shirt that I had stashed in the house and putting on my jeans, I make my way to the fireplace where the clothes from yesterday still hung.

Grabbing my sneakers, I test the soles of the shoes. They are almost dry, and well, guess that will have to do. Looking at them, I think back to what Beatrice told me. Find something that gives you breath that gives you oxygen. Walking over to the shirt, I grab the blue marker that we use to mark the many checklists that we have. Taking my time, I start to color in the white shoe laces, little by little. By removing all that reminds me of this prison, the whiteness purity of the shoe laces and replace it with something that reminds me of home, my true home.

"Blue will guide you home, and if you can see the sky, anything is possible."

Getting on my bike I look back to the house, 37 Brooks, creaking and crackling under the years of wear and tear. I wonder how it looked when people lived inside you, I wonder, must have been a sight. I pedal down to the labs again. This time around there are no trucks waiting for early deliveries, or people in front of the labs. There are no evaluations today, and there are no regulators running around trying to get the situation under control. You can tell that with the rainstorm last night, everything looks clean, everything looks brand new. You can barely hear the sea gulls in the distance. The sun light beams in through the clouds, which are a grayish white color.

At the guard hut, there is a new guard. A couple of feet away I un-mount the bike and begin to walk over to the bike rack. Looking at him from the distance, I place my hands in my pocket and walk whistling a tune.

"Hey," I say lifting my hands.

He looks up and with a clip board in hand walks over to me.

"You must be Alex Warren," he says.

"Must be," I say with a smile. I extend my hand and he looks at it for a second before he shakes it.

"I am Sal's replacement," he says with a stern voice. "Names Lucas."

"Tough to hear about Sal huh," I say. "But it is nice to have you here Lucas."

He nods and walks off to do his rounds. Getting over to the mailboxes I see an envelope labeled to me. Opening it I see it is an advertisement for a new grocery store opening near Monument Square.

"_Vicky's new bakery; the cure for your sweet tooth need. You simply must come and check it out. Samples will be given to those who arrive the same day as opening. So drop everything and come check us out."_

Taking a look at the envelope I see that it was forwarded here because of the incorrect address listed.

"_Alex P. Warren_

_2510 S 1st street, Unit #110-2_

_Portland ME"_

Looking at it carefully, I decode the message using the numbers on the address. Second word, for the "2", fifth word for the "5", and tenth word for the "10".

New, Cure, Need

The South in the address, means the skip the number of lines so, it would be skip the next "1" line. The Unit gives me the mission, and location for the delivery which would be first word for the "1", and tenth word for the "10." The dash is next line.

Sample, same, drop

Looking at my name, I notice the "P" and realize that it is the time, as I do not have a middle name. A for AM drop, and P for PM drop.

_"New cure, need sample, same drop, in the PM."_

It is one of the ways the rebellion inside the fence communicates with each other. Instructions are given in code to through advertisements. The cipher key is always the address that is listed. The post offices in Portland always check the address on the envelope through the Secure Validation System, which houses all of our person information, name, birth date, and addresses of our home and work. The post office uses this system to verify addresses so that there is a sense of efficiency and all mail is delivered to the correct person. When an incorrect address is labeled, they send it to the work address listed for the person.

I look at it for a couple of seconds trying to see the significance of this. They have developed a new cure? The scientist in the Portland facilities are always trying to perfect the cure, and the rebels have always found ways to try to stop them from going to mass production, by contamination, or if all else fails, a total destruction of the facilities. We have come close to a destruction of a government facility, but at the last moment it was avoided.

I place my backpack in my locker and grab my water bottle. It is the only way that I am going to get close to the research facilities. There are tons of cameras, and while no one would stop me, they would question why I am in a restricted area. Checking my watch, I begin to whistle through the hallways walking slowly tossing my empty water bottle in the sky. It is then that I see them.

I give a tilt of my head hello to the guards who patrol the research area of the facilities. Tossing the empty water bottle into the air, they look at it go up and are not paying attention as I slip the ID card from the clip on the belt of one of them.

Both guards know me from the times that I have allowed them to smoke in the dock area which of course is against rules. Finally getting to the research part of the facility, I turn towards the water fountain. Looking through the corner of my eye, I see the camera making the sweeping motion of the door to the researcher materials, where they would be keeping any samples.

Looking at the empty water bottle, I make the mental countdown, as I fill it with water. Once it is at half way, I know that the camera is at the blind spot, so I make my move, swiping the ID card and entering the researcher materials lab. There on the metal table I see the syringes, I walk towards it keeping my head down knowing that the amount of time I have is very little to get the syringe and get out. I swipe the syringe and place it in my pocket walking right out.

Looking again through the corner of my eye, I see the camera is sweeping back onto the door. I let out a deep sigh of relieve and finish filling my water bottle with the water. Beginning to whistle again, I walk back through the hallway and see the same two guards walking back from their rotation.

"Hey guys," I say.

They nod.

"We still on for tomorrow?" I say cracking a smile. They are about to answer when I purposefully drop the water bottle, making it seem that I missed catching it. The guard that I swiped the ID card from bends down to grab it, and then I clip back the ID to his belt.

"You know it," the other one say. The guard hands me the water bottle.

"Hopefully you don't have butterfingers with the ball tomorrow," he says smiling.

"Don't worry about me," I say walking away from them. Beginning to whistle I walk back to the guard hut and there is where I see them. The same pony tail glistening in the sunlight, the same intense eyes, that could cut right through you if you stared long enough.

"Pretty crappy security for a major medical facility." The girl with the blond hair says.

"Pretty crappy security for a petting zoo," the girl with the pony tail says.

"I resent that," I say walking towards them. Both of them twirl around as if a gun had just been shot. The color fades from both of them, and they turn almost paper white.

I cross my arms and look at them there, obviously not expecting to find anyone here. And of course I wasn't expecting to ever find her here either.

"I leave for two seconds to get a refill," I say tilting the water bottle in my hand. "And I come back to find a full-fledged break-in."

It takes only a couple of seconds and the girl with the blonde hair says.

"We weren't breaking in. We weren't doing anything. We were just running and we…um, we got lost."

"Didn't see the any of the sings outside huh? 'No Trespassing'? 'Authorized Personnel Only'?"

She looks away not willing to see that I was only joking.

"Must have missed them," she says barely raising her voice. Both of them you could tell are nervous, and well just trying to contain myself from laughing is as hard as keeping the conversation going.

"Uh-huh," I say pointing to the nearby sign. The sign that says Authorized Personnel is almost as tall as me. Painted in bright red, and yellow, in large lettering, I am pretty sure they missed this one. "They're pretty subtle. Only a few dozen of them. I can see how you might not have noticed."

Looking towards the harbor, I see the seagulls flying in the distance. What a beautiful day, and yet I cannot help but smile at the fact that she is here.

Turning back to see her, her eyes meet mines for the first time, and I can see that nervousness slowly recedes.

"You. I saw you -" she stammers out.

She recognizes me from yesterday. The way her mouth pouts when she is angry, it is simply adorable. The blonde hair girl interrupts me from looking too long.

"You two know each other?" She asks.

I turn and look at her. Her anger has started to recede and now I look down at her hands, the way she rubs them.

"No," I say. "We've never met. I'm sure I would remember."

"I'm Hana," the blonde hair girl says. "And this is Lena."

Lena. Such a pretty name. Finally I know her name.

"Alex. Nice to meet you," I say extending my hand to her. She shakes it.

Turning my eyes to her, the look of surprise is still on her face.

"Lena," I say, extending my hand out to shake hers. "I've never heard that name before."

Her hand finally reaches for mines and when we touch it is like I feel my heart begin to beat again. For so long I have felt like that house in the Highlands and now it feels different, almost like there is a purpose now.

"It is short for Magdalena," she says.

"Magdalena," I say again testing it in my mouth, how smoothly it just flows. "Pretty."

She looks away for a quick second before turning to me. Her eyes now heated with intensity.

"I _do _know you. I saw you yesterday in the labs. You were on the observation deck, watching – watching everything," she says.

I look at her for a couple of minutes and examine the way she tenses up when she is angry.

"Case of mistaken identity, I guess. Guards aren't allowed in the labs during evaluations. Especially not part-time guards."

The couple of seconds that we just stare at each, seems to be endless. Up close, I see that she is as beautiful as what I had imagined. That day in Monument Square, and then in the evaluations, who would have guessed she would be here today.

"So this is it? A part-time security guard and some 'Keep Out' signs?" I hear Hana say.

Turning my eyes to her, I ask. "What do you mean?"

"I would have thought the labs would be better protected, that's all. It doesn't seem like it would be too hard to break into this place."

Tilting my head, "thinking about making the attempt?"

Her face freezes and the color that was just coming back, suddenly disappears and the white scared look is on her face again.

"Relax. I was kidding," I say. "You don't exactly seem like terrorists. This is just the loading area, anyway, for freight and stuff. Real security starts closer to the facilities. Full-time guards, cameras, electrified fence, the whole shebang."

"The loading area? Like where the deliveries come?" Hana says almost too excitedly. Obviously she wants to know about yesterday and the 'deliveries.'

"You got it," I say.

She starts to hop on her feet, almost as if she was going to open presents for her birthday.

"So this is where the trucks come? With medical equipment and…and other stuff?"

Smiling, I just nod and say. "Exactly."

After a couple of seconds, my eyes shift from Hana, to Lena's. She of course looks away shyly at the moment that I look at her.

"I'd love to look around," Hana says, which causes me to look at her.

I toss my bottle water in the air and tell her. "Trust me, there's nothing to see. Unless you're a fan of industrial waste. There's plenty of that around here," I say. "Oh – and the best view of the bay in Portland. We've got that going for us too."

"Really?" she says curiously.

"_That_ I can show you," I say. "Come on."

We walk towards the service road that finally goes up a hill to the storage sheds. It is a walk and well I do have check on it anyways, so they follow me up the dirt road.

"So if you are part-time, means you are going to school?" Hana asks.

"Yes I am on my second year at the University of Portland," I say.

"What are you studying," she says.

"Medical technician," I say. "I was going to go for researcher but the technician is where the real money is."

She lets out a laugh and tells me that both of them are about to graduate from high school.

"I couldn't wait to get out of high school," I say. "Waking up early everyday to go to school was simply not me."

"So second year means you are 19?" she asks.

"Yeah," I say. "And if you want to know, I am a medium and my favorite color is blue, just in case you want to get me a gift."

"Well we are about to turn eighteen in a couple of months," she says. "So can start thinking about what to get us."

Looking over to Lena, I can see the sweat that is pooling on her forehead.

"Would you like a sip of water?" I say turning around.

"No," Lena says sharply.

The top of the hill is just in view, and when we finally make it, Hana just walks towards the edge of the hill.

"It's amazing. Gorgeous, isn't it? No matter how long I live here I never get used to it. I think this is my favorite way to see the ocean. Middle of the afternoon, sunny and bright. It's just like a photograph. Don't you think , Lena?"

Her arms are now crossed and I see a dark ink blot on her right elbow. Walking over to her I examine it closely, I can feel my breathing getting shallow. My heart beat begins to quicken and all I can do is continue walk closer to her. The ink blot on closer examination is a mole and all I can do is smile at the thought. Her ear is probably a couple of feet from me, and all I want to do is tell her everything. My heart beating so hard, and for the first time, nothing comes to my mind.

Finally I blurt out.

"Grey."

She turns and looks at me, surprised. Her eyes dances with the sunlight. The waves pound in the background, as the wind dances with her unraveled hair.

"What?" she asks. "What did you say?"

At this time all I can do is inch closer to tell her everything. That I was there, listening to her, tell her about my favorite story and how grey is a beautiful color.

"I said, I prefer the ocean when it's gray. Or not really gray. A pale, in-between color. It reminds me of waiting for something good to happen."

Her mouth begins to open and then close when she realizes that it is the same exact thing that she said.

"You lied. Why did you lie?" she says.

Turning a little bit from her, I continue saying.

"Of course it's even prettier at sunset. Around eight thirty the sky look like it's on fire, especially at Back Cove. You should really see it."

I continue to look out towards the horizon, trying to let her catch what I am trying to say. Looking back to her, I smile.

"Tonight…it will probably be amazing."

She arches one of her eyebrows at me, and then blinks a couple of times quickly.

"Are you asking me to -?" she starts to say, before Hana comes and grabs her arm.

"God," she says. "Can you believe it's after five already? We've got to _go."_

They start to move down towards the hill and finally as she disappears from my view, all I can hope is to see her again tonight.


	8. Chapter 8

eight

_Magdalena_

I repeat it over and over in my head as I walk towards the park at Back Cove. It is an amazing thought, that someone could occupy your entire focus, having everything else fade into nothingness. Everything else after that time on the hill is a blur, almost like it didn't really happen. Like all I can think about: the sunset, the swirls of color coming in and out of each other, the horizon swallowing it all, in a brilliant explosion of passion, the comparison of the world's beauty, to her, and I don't know yet which is more intense, which is more breath taking.

The static from a nearby regulator, rips me from my dream world. They are walking out of the park at Back Cove. The park at Back Cove is small and nestles by a small controlled forest that I always thought was odd. The forest has its beginning and its end, and well I always felt that it was sort of a prison for them, having their branches cut, to match an invisible wall. We never go in there, as it could well be filled with listening devices from regulators and hidden cameras.

There is a small trail though that goes along the cove, and bends away for a small time. It is there that most of our drops are made. A bench and a garbage bin right next to it. Right before you go into the park there is a sandwich truck, which we use to gauge whether the drop would be clean or not. If there is a food item that is '86' then it is a compromised drop. You are to come to the truck and order the special of the day. If the cook tells you about the weather then it is a clean drop. Anything else would be considered as a caution, enter at your own risk. To confirm you understand, the code for it, is to ask for extra ketchup and onions.

Walking up to the truck, I look at the menu and see that there are no 86 items for today written on the white erase board. So I walk up and read the specials, 'grilled chicken.'

The chef looks at me as I approach the window.

"Hey Pete, I will have the Special," I say.

He turns around and starts to cook the sandwich. The sizzling sound of the chicken touching the hot stove, always causes me to close my eyes and remember about the barbecue we would have outside in the Wilds. Although grilled chicken doesn't smell like raccoon, well sort of.

"Beautiful day out no?" He asks with his back to me.

"It is," I say tapping the metal shelf playfully. "Can't wait to see the sunset."

That is actually partly true, what I wish I could say, is that I cannot wait to see her again. I see him start to place it on the bun, and then he slows down just a little.

"Oh, can you put in extra onions and ketchup?" I say. "I almost forgot."

He nods and places extra onions on the sandwich, and places a little bit more of ketchup on the underside of the top bun. He wraps it quickly and hands it to me. He tells me the price which I hand him. He nods and I walk towards the path. There isn't anyone really there. There never is anyone there. The city has a mandatory curfew for anyone that doesn't have the procedure. Sitting at the bench I run my hands through my hair, and feel the scar of the procedure.

The memory, the sizzling of skin burning.

"Hold him still," he says a couple of moments before.

In the basement of a older couple, sympathizers of the rebellion, they have a sound proof room with a table, and a chair with straps. It is our doctor, to those who are from the outside, living inside Zombieland. He does everything from setting broken bones, stitching cuts, burns, and the occasional fake procedural scar.

"You are going to have to hold him," the doctor says to turning to Gabriel.

Gabriel stands in the corner of the basement, with his arms crossed. Him like me, do not like hospitals, and of course hate needles. Looking at him, his expression is one of disapproval, but not for the reason that you may think. It isn't because I shouldn't get it, it is a necessity for the us to blend in, but because of the need to in the first place.

"Normally, you would be put under for this, but that sort of medicine is hard to get," the doctor says, looking over to Gabriel who has now positioned himself in front of me looking at me.

"Ready?" Gabriel says looking at me. "Close your eyes and deep breathes."

Holding down on the arm rest, I close my eyes and try to think of anything else. Anything but was is about to happen, the anticipation I think is the worst thing about this. Well that is what I thought, until I started to feel the heat on my neck, and realized that the three pronge instrument was close enough to emit the heat from the points.

The thing that I remember about that day, is not the pain, it isn't that. The one thing that I could not forget, is the smell of flesh being burnt.

The scar itself actually doesn't come from the actual procedural, but from the three pronged needle holder that digs into your skin at least an inch or so. With the holder in place, the scientist would have an easier time to guide the four inch needle into the right side of your brain underneath your ear. I have only seen it done once before, and really it was an accident. A horrible accident that sometimes, haunts me in my dreams, the thought of it, brings a shiver to my body. The green liquid being pushed into the brain, left there and then when the plunger comes back, it removes the areas that are supposedly prone to infection. The pale green color that comes out, like vomit when you are sick, still causes my stomach to turn.

Looking down, I think to myself.

'Great job Alex, thinking about that lovely memory, and here I was looking forward to eating this chicken sandwich that looked appetizing a minute ago and now...'

There is no other choice I have to eat it. The aluminum foil is what I need, but I need it to be without the food. Looking over to the garbage can, it looks so tempting just to chuck it and keep the foil, but if they were to find the sandwich in the garbage, they may question it, and look at all the balled up aluminum foils.

Taking a bite from it, I just breathe deeply and concentrate on eating it. After a couple of minutes and struggle the whole sandwich is gone, and smiling, I ball up the aluminum foil keeping it in my left hand, while I open the backpack. Inside I reach and grab the balled up aluminum foil inside my pack with the vial in the center. Dropping the other one inside, I grab the water bottle.

The switch is made. Opening the water bottle I lean over to the garbage can and toss the balled up foil with the vial inside the garbage can. Taking a couple gulps of water from my bottle water, all I can do now is just enjoy the fact that the drop was done cleanly. All I really have to do now is wait a minute or so, and walk out of the park.

Looking at my watch, I see it is almost eight thirty. Standing up and waiting a couple of seconds, all I do is close my eyes, and there it comes.

_Magdalena_

Her name floats in on the breeze of the ocean. Walking over to the railing, I just stand there for a little bit, watching the sunset over the ocean horizon. The colors of brightness just as the sun begin to hide over the ocean. There is a little bit of sadness in my heart, as I catch my watch and see it is already passed eight thirty. Guess she couldn't make it. It was difficult I try to make excuses; probably she couldn't get out of her house. Or she could have been coming, and got stopped by the Regulators.

The darkness creeps in, and I see what was a nice sunset now begins to take the underbelly side of it all. What if she wasn't coming at all, could have misunderstood as a joke. I push back from the railing that has now become cold in my palms.

If she did make it, she would certainly never make it back to her home before curfew. It is a lot to ask for someone that I just met, to break the law, to do something rash. Who knows, probably she wasn't really that interested anyways.

The nearby rock, looks like a good way to remove some frustration. I kick it along the path, and see it skip, skip, skip and then finally disappear into the darkness. Walking over to the bike, I just grab it and riding back, I avoid the major streets. Really don't want to be stopped by Regulators.

The street empty at this time, it is a little bit before nine, and curfew for everyone who hasn't had the procedure is at exactly nine. Anyone caught out, after that, is breaking the law, and is subject to be thrown in jail, or at the very least, placed under suspicion. There is no one on the sidewalks, or even cars driving around. It does remind me though of those nights where we would sneak off to vandalize government buildings, and scientist homes.

I pump the pedals more and more, as the adrenaline begins to course through my body. Making it to the apartments with little or no time, I stand out there staring at the door; It is there that I think to myself that it is way too late to go the Highlands, at least without bringing attention.

The apartment is just how I left it two days ago, papers on the small desk that comes with the apartment. On the ground is a small flyer that was more than likely thrown under my door. I pick it up and look at it. There is nothing on it, but a date and time and of course a marker.

"Friday, 2:00 AM"

It is a white piece of paper with a specific location marker. These are always two lines, either straight parallel or crossing each other, or even wavy lines. For the people who have been to these parties before, they are usually done in rural locations, or in abandon homes. The cross lines means at an intersection, and the two parallel, means in a community. The two wavy lines here indicate that it is a party in a rural location.

These are the flyers of the underground. Funny how there are people here in school that consider themselves part of some underground to society. They listen to unapproved music, and hold unapproved concerts in abandon houses or even in fields. The music isn't that bad, expression rarely is. There is of course, alcohol and even drugs. There are three types of people that go to these underground parties. First you have the uncureds that do not care for the rules, so boys and girls dance together without the fear of infection, many would say that they don't care. They are the ones that believe in the procedure, their safety net. The others are the cureds who are longing to feel the way they felt before. I have seen them walking through the University, like shadows, or even ghosts, that long to be what they once were. Then of course are the rebels that hide among them as cureds. We always use these parties for communication only, as drops are mostly unsecured in these parties, too many eyes.

Placing the white paper on the desk, I look up and see something that always bothered me.

There are books on the bookshelf that I hardly ever read, only when I have to study. The garbage seriously that I have to remember is enough to make me want to not be here. They all stare at me from the shelf, the history of the Cure, the Benefits of living in today's society, Symptoms of Amor Deliria Nervosa, and of course the Safety Health, and Happiness handbook. I don't know how many times I have burned that dumb book of Shhh, at first I couldn't even read a page before missing home. Looking at the bookshelf, I can't help but think of home. Think of the mounds and mounds of books in the bookshelf and on the floor in columns.

Walking over to the shelf and take all four books that I am suppose to have visible, for school and for society, and walking over to the closet, I open and throw them in. I can't think of home, there is more at stake now.

Looking at the bed rustled around. I smirk at it. Almost looks like I actually slept in it. Opening my backpack I throw away the aluminum foil in the garbage and lying down on the ground, I look at the moon from my window. The backpack as my pillow, it is much more comfortable than sleeping up there. It is the only way I can sleep, the comforts of a bed, always bothered me, it was always too soft, almost like there was nothing there at all.

Ever since my first day here in Portland, I couldn't sleep on any mattress, so Beatrice, just gave up and let me sleep on the ground of my room.

Looking at the moon, I see the stars, and it is then that it comes again. A flash of today and her eyes dance in my dreams as I close my eyes.

The days go by as a blur, and really I don't see Lena at all anywhere. I even started to take breaks at the old Grind hoping that she would run by again. It seems that life just pauses, and well it feels almost as if life has again begun to drain itself of all its color.

"So Alex, what are your plans for the weekend?"

I turn and see that a Shana is walking in the hallway from class. She is in my history class and is one of those people that I catch looking at themselves in the mirror, trying to remember who they were before the procedure.

"Nothing really," I say. "Probably go down to Sunset Park."

She holds her books close to her chest as if she lets them go just a little bit, they will simply disappear. Shana Wilkerson is a person I know from my time at the Grind. She would always come in and grab coffee for her morning classes.

"How is Eloise?" she asks.

Eloise is the match that was given to the admission office when I enrolled in the University of Portland. We had to find someone in Portland around the same age as me that was either invalidated or well no longer here.

Eloise Kurtz was a young lady in Ward 3 of the Crypts, well she was Eloise Kurtz. When you are deemed mentally unstable the government invalidates your ID number and instead changes it an inmate intake number. Our friends over at C.O.R.E. just had Eloise Kurtz number validated and placed as my match. There are only two options for me when I started the University of Portland. The first would be another person from the outside that volunteers to be part of project 'Trojan Horse' to come in and take her place as Eloise Kurtz. Beatrice would tell me that soon, someone would come in, and then it would be okay, but in her eyes I saw what I knew what happen. It would be the second option, of when I finish school, my assignment is completed and I am to have to leave Portland. This option when I first started school was the one that I longed for. It was the fact that I could go back to the Wilds that my job in the city of Portland would be over, it was something that was my goal. That was before that day, a year back. It was before I met her.

In my second year at the University of Portland and there has been no chatter of anyone else coming in that would fit the age requirement of Eloise. It is something that I had buried in the back of my mind as a "may not happen" and the actual overtaking may happen in the next two years. That is my hope that is now my desire. I don't want to leave, and if I told anyone the reason why, I would be pulled out.

"She is fine," I say trying to match the tone of her voice. "Spending time with her family."

"Well have a great weekend," Shana says and there walking away, her name draws to me like music, like soft music that slowly creeps in.

_Magdalena _

Settling myself, I walk through the quad and down the street. It has been weeks since I thought of her. Sure after that day in the labs, I had a couple of dreams, but after not seeing her for a while, I just started to get back to the routine. I knew though, that in the back of my mind, things had changed. Now as I think of her more it takes over my focus.

_Bang_

I come to and look left and right, realizing that I am in an alley between two buildings. I see the stupid cat that probably jumped down onto the large garbage bin run pass me.

Stupid cat, I murmur to myself. It is then I see Blaine walking away from a girl. In the distance I see her hair color, blonde. It is a flicker of false hope, thinking that it could be Lena's friend.

He nods and hands me a paper.

"It is going to be epic," he says. The same white paper, with nothing but the two squiggly lines which gives me an idea of a rural area, and a cow which is that old run down farm, and the time, ten-thirty.


	9. Chapter 9

nine

Music has the ability to connect you with a part of you that you probably thought you lost. It is something that I realized once, at a party. It was probably two years ago or something like that, when the rebellion contact wanted to meet in one of these parties. It was right when I had graduated from high school. It was in an old abandon warehouse, out in the boonies.

It takes longer than usual as the regulators were out in full force that night. I had almost thought I had lost my window of opportunity but when I got to the party, it was something that I couldn't describe to you, it was after all an experience. There is no security, the chain link fence to old "Babson Pharmaceutical Company" had signs that said, 'Warning, Condemned, No trespassing' but everyone just took that as a welcome sign.

You can hear the music from a distance. The loud pumping sound faint at first but louder as you walk towards the old condemned building. It is funny though, but for a minute I think that the music isn't something that I am hearing, but it is something that I am feeling from the inside. Almost like if it traveled from some invisible underground wire, and up into my shoe, and then throughout my body. The music like it awoken something inside me, like it buried itself deep inside, pushing past everything, and there connecting something old and deep from a past life that I didn't think existed.

"Hey you made it," Bolt says running towards me. Bolt never did give me his inside name, he told me that with those that are part of the real world, need not be part of that one that is always sleeping.

"You know it," I say. "I wouldn't miss hearing this for the world."

He ushers me inside and hands me a plastic cup from the table. Looking at the brown liquid, I almost want to ask him what it is, but don't, as I see him chugging it down like it is water.

Shrugging I take a sip and then down the whole thing. The stinging liquid burns it way down my throat and into my stomach where all I can say to Bolt is one word.

"Smooth."

He lets out a laugh, and turning I see his procedural scar.

"Alex, there are going to be some major girls coming from the nearby prep school," Bolt says, which means in code, major changes or girls, coming from the top or nearby school.

"Yeah? Care to fill me in on who is single and who will be the challenging one," I say, but really mean, how safe is the plan and what the chances of being caught are.

"Dozens of single ladies, I know, I know, bummer because you like the challenging ones," he responds or it is a long term assignment (dozens), but it is safe hardly any risk of being exposed.

We walk through the crowd and making small talk with other people in between sets of musicians. All the time I couldn't help but think about my next assignment. The whole time in high school, it was all about letting me get acquainted with life inside. Of course the being constantly in trouble never helped, so for my entire senior year, I did the complete opposite and conformed to life here.

"Ladies," he says walking up to a group of girls near one of the stages. "I like you to meet my UP friend here, Alex."

The girls smile and shake my hand. In an instant I look over to Bolt and he shakes his head slightly. It is there that I realize my next assignment. It is this, the whole underground scene, the whole college experience. The whole night after that was lost in the thoughts of what exactly will I be doing at the University of Portland? That of course all came later, in a welcome packet with my course information and my major of study. The fact that the job in the labs came later as it was harder to falsify paperwork that deep that was surely to get red flag and checked by the police.

Looking at myself in the mirror I think about the two years stuck inside the University, identifying how many of the people that went to the University would be open to a possible uprising. To gauge there responses when there would be demonstrations from the rebellion.

I stick my hands in my jacket pocket and feel the crumbled up paper. Taking it out, I see the party advertisement and decide to go and see. Taking the bike I begin to ride through the maze of streets that is Portland, trying to forget the things that I have just experience. Wonder if his cover was blown, and now sits in the room of an interrogation by regulators or police.

It takes me almost forty five minutes to forget it, the time it takes me to get to the party. It is in place I know all too well. The burnt out farm was one of the many places that I would try to escape to. It was there that when they told me that my father had already died, that I felt the need to take something that belonged to them. They took something, and I was going to take something of theirs.

Still can remember how fast the farm went up in fire when I sprayed it with the alcohol that I found in Beatrice's bathroom. Now it just stands there as a reminder of something that I never want to feel again, the anger inside me, it was something that scared me. Even now after all those years it is something that I have to keep under control.

There is a good crowd when I finally arrive. The band is playing through a song that I have heard before. It is a basic remix of a song that you would hear on LAMM, but of course the words are changed the addition of the electric guitar makes it feel as if it is a new song, but the undertones are the same.

It is then that I see her. In the distance I see her, the blonde hair. She is here with a small group of girls, and as I causally look over the girl that is with her, I don't see her.

"Hey, you made it," I hear coming from behind me. "Didn't think you'd show."

Turning around, I see Bolt coming with a cup in his hand. His smile is reassuring and well after hearing nothing from the resistance in a while, seeing him make it seems like I am not alone in this.

"And miss hearing the great music?" I say. "Not on your life."

We scan the room and looking at some people he nods and gives a smile here and there. The music is electric and dances in the air, seemingly like nothing would stop it from reaching everyone. Songs of love always do, it seems like all the barriers that we would put up, would be taken down in an instant. I wonder if it is true though, what they say about love. That it changes you, makes you act in ways that you wouldn't normally do. The whole time I have been here in Portland, I have been lost and searching for a way to get out. And now, after a couple of encounters, short brief conversations, I am searching for a way to stay…

"…you're here," I hear voice become clear as a bell over all the music. Looking around all I see is a sea of people, lifting their plastic cups up in celebration. The cheering swells and the music gets drown away. The different color lights catch people in a freeze frame of sort, some laughing, some caught with their mouths open, it is a snap shot of emotion, of happiness.

"Give me a sec," he says to me. I look at him and nod. Walking a little bit towards the band, I see that everyone who is here is enjoying the music, really enjoying it. I see a couple dancing, their hands intertwined with each other. The way her eyes meet his, it is almost as if both of them are wind chimes and the music is moving them, swaying them, left and right.

"So Alex," I hear, and turn seeing Bolt had walked back.

"Where did you go?" I say.

"Had to get a drink to this girl from St. Anne, that asked me for one," he says. "Funny, that her friend totally spazzed on them."

He points back towards a general location and the whole crowd freezes for a moment, and there I see her eyes. It is almost as if my desires were projecting something that wasn't really there. The crowd like the waves of the ocean begins to push against me, and like the waves I brace and push forward.

She is leaving, and I have to hurry if I want to make it to her. I see her, making her way through the crowd, almost as if she is an expert at it, ducking and weaving.

"Lena!" I shout out finally, hoping that she hears me.

She hesitates a little almost as if I caught her by surprised. She doesn't turn though, she just pauses for a second and then, continues walking.

"Lena! Wait." I say again.

Finally she stops and turns around, and finally our eyes meet. I am lifting my hand to make sure that she sees me, to make sure that she isn't just a ghost that I dreamt up.

"What are you doing here?" she says.

Smiling, same old right to the point, Lena, one of the things that I like about her, she doesn't hold back. Almost as if she has no filter.

"Nice to see you too," I say.

Her face is neutral and finally frustrated her forehead begins to crease slightly. It is like everything about her I catch, all the smallest movements, all the smallest changes, and to me, all of it, looks beautiful to me.

"I am serious," she says with a stern face.

"I came to hear the music," I say nodding back towards the stage. "Like everyone else."

"But you can't -" she starts to say, obviously surprised to see a guard, someone who she believes is part of the system be here in a place that the government condemns. "But this is -"

"Illegal?" I say shrugging at her. "It is okay, nobody's hurting anybody."

It is the truth though. Although the location says no trespassing, although it is abandoned, how different is it from the concerts that they have in the park. People show up to those all the time in the summer. The music, classical and honestly, boring. Anything really that causes a emotional reaction and they are quick to say that it is illegal, quick to say that you cannot do this, or you cannot listen to that, or even talk to people. All these rules and all we are really doing is just listening to music. Looking away towards the stage, towards the group of people there just laughing and having a great time, how is this wrong, I think to myself.

"So what about you?" I say. "What's your excuse?"

"I didn't want to come," she says immediately, but then pauses. "I had to…I had to give something to someone."

Sometimes I wish I could be like her, not thinking but just saying what I truly wish to say. Like I wish I could just say, 'I am glad you did come,' but of course the only thing that I could do is look at her.

"To Hana. My friend. You met her the other day," she continues talking, obviously nervous. I put my hands in my pocket, as it is the only way to wipe the sweat that has been on my hand since I saw her. What is it about her that causes me to become so unhinged? I have to stay there struggling to maintain myself calm. All I can truly do is just smile and keep my eyes looking at her. Wishing that she would stay, wishing that I could get her to continue to talk with me.

"I remember," I say. "You haven't said you're sorry yet…by the way."

She looks at me confused and a little bit startled. It is like I have said something in another language. Her arms come from being uncrossed finally to be at her waist.

"For what?" she spits back.

"For standing me up…you were a no-show at Back Cove that day." I say.

Her face relaxes and then tenses up again. Her eyes go from mines to the floor almost if she doesn't know what I am talking about. She then looks up and as I think she is about to say something she finally doesn't, she just looks at me.

"So?" I say folding talking my hands out of my pocket and folding my arms. "Are you going to apologize, or what?"

She looks up at me, and finally with a steady voice says something that I am not prepared for.

"I don't apologize to liars," she says.

Liar? When I told her to meet me at Back Cove, was that the reason why she didn't show up?

"What's that supposed to mean?" I say.

"Come on," she says almost as if I know what she is talking about. It is obviously something that I didn't realize doing. "You lied about even being _inside_ the labs on Evaluation Day."

Lifting up my hands.

"Okay, okay," I say surrendering. "I'm sorry okay? Look, I'm the one who should apologize."

Standing there I can tell that she is finally pleased by the fact that I am not holding anything back from her.

"I told you, security isn't allowed in the labs during evaluations. To keep the process 'pure' or something, I don't know. But I really needed a cup of coffee, and there's this machines on the second floor of the C complex that has the good kind, with real milk and everything, so I used my code to get in. That's it. End of story. And afterward I had to lie about it. I could lose my job. And I only work at the stupid labs to subsidize my school…"

Stopping there I realize that being on the observation deck is something that I did on my own. It was the moment that I realized that without knowing she was reading what was truly in my heart. It was then that I knew.

"So why were you on the observation deck? Why were you watching me?" She says.

If I could only just say, because I like you, because I remembered you from that day in Monument Square. This truly has never happened, it scares me to realize that I am not as confident as I once led people to believe. This could be love, that causes me to become this unhinged, this unprepared. I do what is natural, what they taught me to do….I lie.

"I didn't even make it to the second floor," I say. "I came inside and – and I just heard this crazy noise. That rushing roaring sound. And something else. Screaming or something."

I clearly omit the fact that I heard her answers, that I heard my heart answering the same way. The way she says that her favorite color was grey; it still scares me and also excites me at the same time.

She closes her eyes, almost as if she is trying to picture it. Her face totally relaxes for that small sliver of time. Lost in the memory of thoughts, I wonder what she is thinking about. Clearly it isn't about the cows or the screaming, but could be the ocean coast.

She opens her eyes, and there she sees me, almost as if my guards have been taken down. Almost if I have been found out, caught in a lie, and caught in my past, of my life in the Wilds.

"Anyway, I had no idea what was going on. I thought – I don't know, it's stupid – but I thought maybe the labs were under attack or something."

Shifting my weight, I don't know why, but it bothers me to lie to her.

"And then as I'm standing there, all of a sudden there's like a hundred _cows_ charging me…there was a staircase to my left. I freaked out and booked it. Figured cows don't climb stairs."

Sounds possible, if she wasn't paying attention, I think.

"I ended up on the observation deck."

She looks at me, trying to make sense of what I just said.

"So, you don't know anything about how…how it happened?" she says carefully, not to mention what I know she wants to know.

"The mix-up in the deliveries, you mean?" I say honestly. "I wasn't in charge of signing for deliveries that day. The guy who was – Sal – was fired. You're supposed to check the cargo. I guess he skipped that step."

"Satisfied?" I say extending my hands

She nods. "Satisfied."

"So…" I say nodding towards the band. "Think we can get closer without getting trampled?"

"Actually, I was just heading home." She says. The tone in her voice, almost as if she is annoyed.

"Heading home? You can't go home." I say.

"I can and I am," she says turning and going up the hill towards the main road. I just stand there for a couple of seconds, thinking to myself, did that just happen? Looking at her just go like this, I wonder should I follow. Is it wise to follow? My mind says, but my heart says go, so doing what I always do, I follow my heart.

"Wait!" I say running behind her up the hill.

She turns and now we are eye to eye. The slope of the hill has given her a height advantage. The moon light catches her eyes just so, that her eyes look so soft, so inviting. Her hair, not in a pony tail now, just flows effortlessly on her shoulders. It is funny how I never noticed that her collar bones look like little wings. I guess at the angle that I talk to her; I hardly see her eye to eye.

"What are you doing?" She says.

"What do you mean?" I say smiling, trying to catch my breath. "I just want to talk to you."

"You're following me. You're following me again." She says crossing her arms.

Following? When did I follow her? Only tonight was I trying to talk to her. It is sort of unsettling; did she notice me that day in Monument Square?

"Again?" I say confused.

Like a dam that has held all the water of the world behind her, it seems that it finally broke open.

"I think it's a little bit strange that I go pretty much my whole life without seeing you, and then all of a sudden I start seeing you everywhere." She says frustrated.

Believe me I know what she means, but not for the reason that she says. I see her everywhere now, because I think I see her everywhere. It is funny though how she thinks that she sees me everywhere, could it be that she is thinking about me? I haven't seen her physically since the labs, so I don't know where she is referring to.

"Maybe you just haven't been paying attention," I say playfully.

"What – what do you mean?" she says unsure.

"I mean that you're wrong. We've seen each other plenty." I say.

She looks at me with that same confused look, almost as if she is trying to go through all the experience in her life to see where we would have seen each other.

"I would remember if we'd met before." She says not realizing what she means by saying this. I could continue down this thread, tease her because she is saying that our meeting would have been memorable, but I don't, she is nervous enough as it is and of course I have to hide the fact that I feel the warmness in my face starting to rise.

"I didn't say that we'd _met,_" I say, thinking about the following thing. If I mention the Governor, she will know, but would it be such a bad thing. For once I will do the exact opposite of what I was told in the Wilds.

'Don't let anyone in, and you won't get hurt.'

"Let me ask you a question," I start to say taking a small unnoticeable breath to steady my nerves. "How come you don't run past the Governor anymore?"

It is there the small pause, the moment that seems to be extended into an eternity as I wait to see how she would respond. Would she get it, I think to myself.

She lets out a little gasp, as if I had discovered something no one ever knew about.

"How did you know about the Governor?"

I smile.

"I take classes at UP," I say. "I worked at the Grind last semester, in Monument Square. I used to see you all the time."

Of course that isn't really true, I saw only a couple of times, but I did wish to see her everyday. Once I even timed it so that I would be walking through Monument Square when she would be running by, and of course that day, she didn't pas by. I remember all those times that I tried to get her attention back then, only to chicken out. The note, I think, oh God, even the note that I left in his hand is coming back to my mind.

"I have to switch up my routes up," she says finally after the long pause. "You remember me?"

Her voice trails up as if she is happy that I did notice her. Thank God that it is dark out and I am pretty sure she wouldn't notice the blushing on my face.

"You were pretty hard to miss..." I start pause and realize where I am and then quickly continue. "You used to run around the statue and do this jumping, whooping thing."

"I don't…" she starts and then stops. I am guessing she is going to refute that she even did this. It is then that I guess she drops her guard and tells me the truth. "When you run you sometimes do weird things. Because of the endorphins and stuff. It's kind of like a drug, you know? Messes with your brain."

"I liked it," I say freely. "You looked…"

The image of the bird comes to mind, the freedom that we all desire inside of us and never really show. The freedom of hearing music and letting it take you where ever it wants.

"You looked happy."

She looked like running and breathing was the same thing. It was like she was flying at that moment, free, and no one could tell her differently. I wish I could feel like that again, I wish I could be happy.

"I left a note for you one time. In the Governor's fist, you know?"

She looks surprised. "You left a note for _me?"_

"I'm pretty sure it said something stupid. Just hi, and a smiley face, and my name. But then you stopped coming." I shrug. "It's probably still there. The note, I mean. Probably just a bit of paper pulp by now."

Her hands move from crossed to now rubbing her hands together. She is nervous and I can see from the momentarily lapse of conversation, that I pressed too much, said too much.

"I have to go," she says quickly turning and running up the hill. Grabbing her wrist I say, "Hey. Not so fast," but she jerks it back quickly.

"Lena. Hold on a second." I say trying to calm her.

She is nervous, and for that split second I forgot that she believes in the disease. She believes that she could be infected, that I could be infected. How can I make her see that I am not infected, that she cannot contract it from me?

"You don't have to be worried, okay?" I say softly. "You don't have to be scared. I am not flirting with you."

She stammers confused.

"I'm not – I don't think you were – I would never think that you -" she says.

"Are you flirting with me?" I ask trying to get her to laugh, to break the tension.

"What? No," she says almost as if too shocked to even say anything at all. Guess my attempt to get her to laugh didn't work, and so note to self, flirting will not get her to laugh.

"Relax," I say lifting my hands. "I was kidding. I am safe, remember? I can't hurt you."

There is a gentle breeze and just like that I feel weightless. The way she looks at me, shy now, the guard is down and I can begin to hear the music just trickle in from the nearby party. Looking over I see we are quick a distance from where we were. The trees behind her bend and sway with the wind, almost as if it is dancing along.

"This is my favorite song," I say looking at her. She bites her lower lip a little bit, as to not draw attention to herself. "Have you ever danced?"

"No," she says immediately.

I let out a small laugh at her immediate response.

"It's okay. I won't tell," I say.

Her face changes a little bit, a sort of bittersweet memory that is both happy and sad at the same time.

"My mother used to dance," she says. The way she says it, it is almost as if she misses it. The only thing I don't know is what she misses more, her mother, or dancing with her.

Taking a chance I stick out my hand.

"Would you like to?" I say to her lowly.

"Would I like to what?" she asks matching the same softness to her voice.

"Dance," I say finally walking towards her, making the last attempt. Her hand slowly lifts up, and all I can do is smile and interlace my fingers with hers. It is the same electrical charge that I felt before I feel again. It is almost as if we can only come alive when we touch. My heart goes from beating wildly, to a steady beat. My other hand reaches around her waist and without touching; we begin to mimic the swaying motion of the trees.

It is there that I feel what I had always wanted to. It is the same feeling I think she gets when she runs. I feel like I am flying, and beneath our feet are only the clouds of the sky. As the last couple of inches are taken away, I feel the warmness of her skin from her neck as I lean in. She doesn't pull away, and she doesn't stop moving with me. She like me, is lost in the tangled notes of the song, in the gentle breeze of the wind. Everything falls away and as I come near her ear, I stop thinking and ask what my heart had always wanted.

"Will you meet me tomorrow?"

A pause and then I hear it.

"Yes." She says

"East End Beach, tomorrow six thirty?" I ask.

Pulling away from her I see her eyes, and I notice her gentle nod yes.


	10. Chapter 10

ten

I can still feel the warmth of her neck. The smoothness of her hands is a ghost feeling on mines. I don't know how I got to the apartment last night; all I know is that I must have walked the whole way there. It is only when I am in front of the apartment complex that I realized where I was.

Something has changed. That night although I may have not known it, something has changed. Looking at my room, there is a thought that creeps in. It is something that I haven't thought of in a while, but now I have to come to terms with it. Everything that is in this room, everything that defines me, is a lie, it belong to Alex Warren, who lives with his Uncle Gabriel, and Aunt Beatrice. He studies at the University of Portland, and works at the Labs as a part-time security. His area of study is to become a medical technician. He has no brothers, or any sisters. He is paired with Eloise Kurtz who is studying to become a school teacher. All of it is a lie, and as I see the moon now, it comes to mind.

Two more years, then I would have to leave.

Closing my eyes I fight it, the necessity to do what is right, what is right for the cause. I don't know if I believe in that anymore. Finally after a couple of hours, or trying to figure out what to do, one thing comes to mind. The only person I trust with this would be Beatrice. I guess I will see her tomorrow.

The night is filled with flying clocks, and the loud ticking that drives me to run, drives me to try and hide. The nightmares of being captured in an hour glass, feeling the fear of having sand being poured on my head. The nightmare of being buried alive, the pounding of my hands against the glass, screaming for help that doesn't come, that is what causes me to jump out and see that the day is already started.

Pulling my t-shirt and jeans on, I grab my shoes and run downstairs. I have to find a solution, because I am running out of time. The peddling to Beatrice's house couldn't go any faster, I am peddling like there is a fire happening, but realizing that it is the fire that is burning inside of me. The blur of people as I pedal through side streets and sidewalks, shouting something or another that of course I ignore, as it doesn't really matter, nothing really matters.

She is outside watering the plants when I finally make it to the house out of breath.

She places the water pot down and looks at me.

"Is everything okay," she says calmly looking from left and right to make sure no one is watching.

"Can…I…talk…to…you?" I say in between breathes.

She walks me inside and goes to the kitchen grabbing a glass of water. Handing it to me, I chug it down, and finally when I am able to catch my breath, she sits down and with her hands folded on her lap waits for me to speak.

"Any word?" I say.

She knows exactly what I am referring to, and of course knows that information from the outside is sparse. She nods her head no. We have had a couple conversations about this, the need for me to escape, the need for me to leave.

"What has changed?" She says cautiously. She notices something different, and looks at me scanning everything around me. Looking shyly down, she finally realizes why.

"Does she know?" She pauses.

I look at her, and know what she means. It is something that I don't know how she would react.

I nod no.

"It is a risk," she says. "It could be that she accepts you, and then the decision has to be to leave Portland together."

There is an 'or' I know there is. Choice always has the desire outcome and of course the thing you fear the most. The silence between us seems like it is eternal but of course it is only a second or so.

"Or she could reject you, and in order to protect yourself and the cause, you would have to leave that day, because I have seen it, where they are turned in," she says. "There is a real risk here, you could be captured, and you have seen where they take…"

Her voice trails off as her eyes begin to water. Anyone who is caught being a sympathizer or worst caught being an invalid, are immediately taken to the Crypts. It is the firs time, that I know the cost of it, the cost of being me. I always hated that word, invalid. Like everything else in life was valid and because I had no choice of where I was born, I will forever be invalid.

The anger begins to rise in me, because this world, this government believes that my life shouldn't have happened, that the love my parents shared was a disease and I should have never been born.

Both her hands cup mines and I look down.

"The question is," she says leaning in to whisper. "Is she worth it?"

She stands and taps me on the shoulder as she walks into the kitchen. One of the fail safe for anyone who is in the rebellion is that their past information is changed. So Alex Warren lived with their Uncle Gabriel and Beatrice while in High School. When the next assignment came along and I enrolled in the University of Portland, our friends at C.O.R.E. changed the past address of my previous home to another one that doesn't exist. They have been though to torture this information out of those they have caught, the names of sympathizers in the city of Portland, is much more valuable than the life of an invalid.

She walks back with the book of _Shhh._

"Thank you so much, but I don't think…" standing up putting up my hands in protest. The last thing I need is a lesson from that book, if it could be called that.

"Please," she says softly. "I want to show you something."

Giving in, I sit back down and she places the book in my lap.

"Turn to the section of 'Legends and Grievances'," she says.

"What does that have to do.." I start to say before I am interrupted.

"Please?" She pleads.

Turning the pages through the many lies that are all wrapped up in this book. From the past, the present and even the future of life, that is unsure, and unfulfilling. The first day she gave me this book, I burned it. I couldn't believe that someone would write something like this. I always believed that books took your mind places that you only wish you could go. But this book, all I could see is the destruction of everything, the lies, and the manipulation of it all.

Turning to the chapter of legends, she tells me to stop at a specific page.

'The Story of Solomon'

"You know this story?" She asks. Looking at it, how couldn't I, they only repeated it over and over in high school.

"Yeah," I say.

"The story listed here isn't really how it happened," she says handing me a book, a very old book. Looking at it is very old and very delicate. The spine of the book has almost completely fallen apart and there is tape that is holding it together.

"Turn to the book of 1 Kings 3, and look for a sub heading called 'A Wise Ruling,' she says. Scanning the book, I read the Story of King named Solomon, just like in the book of Shhh. The King had two women approach him and tell him, that the baby was each their own, just like the book of Shhh. This King though in this very old book, did something that the other King didn't, he saved the baby.

I pass my hand through the pages, making it to the edge and then to the cover closing it. Looking up at her, I hand the book back. She gives me a small half smile and then she raises a hand and touches me on the cheek.

I walk out of the house and getting on my bike, begin to slowly pedal towards the coast. The day is just so beautiful that I am not in a hurry to get there.

The whole day watching the ocean waves come in and out, is just as fulfilling as spending time doing something else. The light from the day begins to crest and the birds begin to fly less and less. Turning around I see her coming down to the beach.

"Hi," I say. "I'm glad you came."

Dropping her shoes she looks at me.

"I said I would, didn't I?"

She definitely doesn't hold back, a firecracker.

"I just meant…that you stood me up last time," I say looking at her with a smile. She lets out a small smile looking down at the sand I say. "Sit?"

We both sit down on the sand, and the wind of the waves just brings a smile to my face. My sands dig into the sand, the one of the smallest pleasures that the Wilds do not have. Most of the coastline has been taken by all the border cities, the final insult to it all, freedom without ever see the horizon. These are the moments that just taking in the beauty of the simple things.

I feel a shell in my hand and tossing it into the ocean coast; I turn slightly to see her with her knees up to her chest. She seems almost as if she is happy for a second.

"Tide's going out," I say to her.

"I know," she says. "My mom used to bring me here when I was little. We'd walk out a little bit at low tide – as far as you can go, anyway. Crazy stuff gets stranded on the sand – horseshoe crabs and giant clams and sea anemone. Just gets left behind when the water goes out. She taught me to swim here too."

I had always found it funny how easily you pick up on the smallest things when you are paying attention, well at least I'd like to think so.

'Just gets left behind when the water goes out.'

There is some sadness in that, being left behind. The way she says it almost as if she knows what it feels like.

"My sister used to stay on the shore and build sand castles, and we would pretend that they were real cities, like we'd swum all the way to the other side of the world, to the uncured places. Except in our games they weren't diseased at all, or destroyed, or horrible. They were beautiful and peaceful, and built of glass and light and things."

Such a beautiful thought that she would consider the uncured places beautiful and peaceful, it brings me hope that I could probably tell her. There is a knot though in my heart that is stopping me, it is the thought that she may not want to be with me if she knew. It stops me from saying anything, because how would I even begin to say it.

"I remember my mom would bounce me in the water on her hip. And then one time she just let me go. I mean, not for _real_ real. I had those little inflatable thing-ies on my arms. But I was so scared I started bawling my head off. I was only a few years old but I remember it, I swear I do. I was so relieved when she scooped me back up. But – but disappointed, too. Like I'd lost the chance at something great, you know?"

Every time she speaks of her mother, it is like the light disappears, like a dull old wound that never truly healed. In her words I can hear the longing through for the past to be revived.

"So what happened?" I say looking at her finally meeting her eyes. "You don't come here anymore? You mom lose her taste for the ocean?"

Her eyes move from mines and looks towards the horizon, in the same way that I would do. It is weird but I only know her, really know for a couple for a couple of days and yet I feel like we have always known each other. Like we were separated long ago and just now finally found each other.

"She died," she says lowly. "She killed herself. When I was six."

It is there at that moment that I understand the pain of that lost never truly left. Every time she mentions her mother it is one of those subjects that causes her defenses to come down, and she becomes this vulnerable person.

"I am sorry," I say lowly, wishing I could do more to comfort her.

"My dad died when I was eight months old. I don't remember him at all. I think – I think it kind of broke her, you know? My mom, I mean. She wasn't cured. It didn't work. I don't know why. She had the procedure three separate times, but it didn't…it didn't fix her."

She is like me. Alone in a world that has taken everything that made her smile. I understand why I feel so close to her, because she has had the same pain as I have had. I never got to know my own father, and truly never really knew my own mother. The only thing I know is what I see, and what I have experienced.

We both hold onto the emotion that our lives have given us. I wonder if pain could be taken the same way society says love can be. I guess like her, I don't want them to take it, because it is like taking them away from me. I have heard it happen though, procedures that do not work. It isn't because the scientist didn't do it right, it was because something inside of them didn't want to let go.

"I didn't know there was something wrong with her. I didn't know she was sick. I was too young to understand." She says. "If I had known, maybe I could have…"

It isn't her fault. I want to grab her hands and tell her that nothing was wrong, she wasn't sick, and that it is the whole society that is wrong. The memories that we have make us who we are today. I never knew my mother, or met my father, but I know that although they suffered greatly, they gave their lives so that I may live and now it is what drives me. The memories of them, of how I would like to remember them are what I keep close to my heart.

I turn to her, and see her eyes, the sadness. I reach out and touch her on her elbow ever so lightly. She turns and looks at me.

"I'll race you," I say with a smile.

She looks at me, then her sadness slowly disappears and there is the light in her eyes that I am totally captivated by. A second passes and I extend my hand to help her up. She unclasps her hands from her knees and then I feel it again, the softness of her hands. The warmth of her skin as her hand slides into mines, small enough to be enveloped by mines.

It is okay I want to say, but instead all I can think of is squeezing her hand, to help reassure her.

Her voice has a small touch of happiness in it.

"Only if you've got a think for total humiliation," she says with smugness.

"So you think you can beat me?" I say returning her smugness with my own.

"I don't think. I _know._" She retorts.

"We'll see about that." I tip my head towards the horizon. "First one to the buoys, then?"

She looks a little shocked, but intrigued. "You want to race _into_ the bay?"

"Scared?" I ask smiling.

"I'm not _scared,_ I'm just -"

"Good." I say brushing her hair that has fallen over her shoulder. "Then how about a little less conversation and a little more – _Go!"_

Turning and digging my feet into the sand and making my way into the coast. I am almost touching the water when I hear behind my shoulder.

"No fair! I wasn't ready!" she yells.

The water seems to have followed our lead and begins to retreat running in front of us. I can hear her running behind me and know that pretty soon she will catch me. I maybe fast, but Lena has been running all of her life, this is where she is the happiest, and where she is the best.

Scooping up some sand I turn and see she has almost caught up. Throwing the sand that I scooped up, she lets out a playful shriek and yells at me.

"You are such a cheater!"

Laughing, I yell back. "You can't cheat if there are no rules."

That is when I feel the cold water splashed all over my back and have to jerk to one side. The water isn't warm at all, it is icy cold. Hearing her laugh, and I know the answer to what Beatrice asked me before.

'Is she worth it?'

The buoys are a couple of feet ahead of me, and glancing back I see that I am going to win. Turning back I reach out to touch the buoys and feel her arms around my waist taking me under the water. Coming back to the surface, spitting out water, I hear her yell out.

"I won."

"You cheated," I say looping my arms over the buoys, looking at her lifting her arms cheering to herself.

"No rules," she says, "so no cheating."

Turning to her, "I let you win then."

"Yeah right," she says splashing me. I put up my hands trying to shield the water coming to my face. "You're just a sore loser."

"I don't have much practice at it." I say.

"Whatever," she says lying right next me on the buoy line. Her smile and her laughter still ring through my mind. This is a memory that I hope that she would remember, because it is one that I will always remember.

She looks towards the Old Port, a time before the borders, to a time where like her sand castles it was beautiful and there was no cure to be needed because there was no disease. The sand castles that were once made of brick and stone, not easily taken by the waters of this world, not easily forgotten like the shells left behind. Probably she feels it too, the longing to be free, the desire to see what is out there. It could be that she would accept me.

"Pretty isn't it?" I say.

She looks back towards the horizon and wrinkle her nose.

"It looks kind of like it's rotting, doesn't it? My sister always said that someday it would fall into the ocean, just topple right over."

I let out a laugh. "I wasn't talking about the bridge." I point my chin towards the land beyond the bridge. "I meant past the bridge…I meant the Wilds."

"Can I tell you a secret?" she asks. "I used to think about it a lot. The Wilds, I mean, and what they were like…and the Invalids, whether they really existed."

The word 'Invalid', causes me to flinch.

"I used to sometimes think…I used to pretend that maybe my mom didn't die, you know? That maybe she'd only run away to the Wilds. Not that that would be any better. I guess I just didn't want her to be gone for good. It was better to imagine her out there somewhere, singing…"

It is hope. Although it would mean that she would have been abandoned, it is hope that she wishes her mother happiness instead of death. It reminds me of the Story of Solomon, the unselfishness of the child true mother, but this time, it is Lena's unselfishness wishing that her mother be alive, and the hurt of being abandoned, than having her mother dead, and gone.

It finally hits me. My whole telling her about me, is because I am selfish, I don't want to lose her. She doesn't see me though, not really. Truly, she is a better person than me. All I was think about was me, about feeling the same way I felt yesterday. It is the first time that I allow the thoughts of it truly penetrate. Love being a disease causing me to act differently, think differently. If I told her, would she love me?

What about you?" she asks, which causes me to think.

"What about me what?" I say.

"Did you used to think about going to the Wilds when you were little? Just for fun, I mean, like a game."

A game? Just for fun? I was only deluding myself. She thinks I am one of them, a brainless empty shell, incapable of feeling, incapable of love. Is it that?

"Yeah sure. A lot." Slapping the buoys. "None of these. No walls to run into. No eyes. Freedom and space, places to stretch out, I still think about the Wilds."

"Still?" Even after this?" she says reaching out and touching the scar behind my ear. Pulling back, I look at her.

She deserves to know. I don't want to pretend anymore. Beatrice told me that it was a risk, but what is this, love without risk. I can't stand lying to her. Looking past her, I see the city of Portland, the society that has taken my father, my mother, people I have never knew, people that I could never truly be loved by, and now, they did it again. I let them do it again.

"Lena…" I start to say before I am interrupted by Lena, who is obviously nervous. She begins to babble non-stop.

"Most cureds don't think about that kind of stuff. Carol – that's my aunt – she always said it was a waste of time. She always said there was nothing out there but animals and land and bugs, that all the talks of Invalids was make-believe stuff, kid stuff. She said believing in Invalids is the same thing as believing in werewolves or vampires. Remember how people used to say there were vampires in the Wilds?"

Fantasy. It is what she sees life outside.

"Lena, I have to tell you something," I say a little bit more loudly so that she would stop.

"Did it hurt? The procedure, I mean. My sister said it was no big deal, not with all the painkillers they give you, but my cousin Marcia used to say it was worse than anything, worse than having a baby, even though her second kid took, like fifteen hours to deliver…I'm not scared though. My procedure's coming up. Sixty days. It's dorky huh? That I count. But I can't wait."

"Lena," I say louder causing her to stop. "Listen to me. I'm not who – I'm not who you think I am."

I can feel my heart beating faster and faster. I can see her eyes widen gradually. Can she see my heart beating outside my chest, or is that just me trying to calm myself down.

"What do you mean?" she says shyly.

Taking a deep breath, I finally come out and say it.

"I was never cured," I say. She closes her eyes and I can see that she doesn't really get what I am saying. It wasn't what I was expecting. There are two reactions, the voice echoes in my mind, one is that she will accept it and then you will have to leave…

I push myself to not think about the second, but it is hard to keep it from coming to mind.

"I never had the procedure." I say plainly again.

"You mean it didn't work?" She says trying to cover up the confusion probably. "You had the procedure and it didn't work? Like what happened to my mom?"

"No, Lena. I -" start and stop, impossible. How do I say it, so she wouldn't hate me?

The word continues to come back to me over and over. There is any way of saying it without saying everything. She deserves that, after all that she has gone through, she deserves to know everything.

'Trust.'

"I don't know how to explain." I finish.

"It didn't work and you've been lying about it. Lying so you could still go to school, still get a job, still get paired, and matched, and everything. But really you're not – you're still – you might still be -" she says with retreating from me.

"No." I say trying to tell her I am not sick. That there is no sickness that it has been all a lie by the government, by everyone. That I am just someone who likes her, who wants to be with her.

She continue to retreat slowly, pretending that I cannot notice it. I reach out to try to stop her from leaving. What can I say? What can I do? The way her eyes look at me, almost as if she is going to die by being next to me. Like everything, the dancing, the laughing, the race through the ocean, meant nothing, because now I am the cause of her mother committing suicide.

"I'm telling you I was never cured. Never paired, or matched, anything. I was never even evaluated." I say calmly, like a person trying to convince someone that they are sane, when the other is looking at them like their not.

"Impossible," she says shaking her head. "Impossible. You have the scars."

"Scars," I say. "Just scars. Not _the_ scars."

I turn my head letting her see it.

"Three tiny scars, an inverted triangle. Easy to replicate. With a scalpel, a penknife, anything," I finish.

She closes her eyes; I can see the color vanish from her face. It is a blow to her to know that I am not what she thinks I am. That I am not part of the society that she believes in, it is more than what she can bare.

"How…?" she says after a second or so.

"You have to understand. Lena, I'm _trusting_ you. Do you see that?" I say trying to calm her. "I didn't mean to -"

I stop myself from saying that 'I didn't mean to fall in love, I didn't mean to feel this way,' but I don't, I can't.

"I didn't want to lie to you." I finally say instead, covering the fact that I am still a coward.

"How?" she says again, louder now.

Looking down at the ocean waves. Coming in and out, and finally realize that I too have abandoned her. That it will be like the second one, she will reject me.

"I'm not from here," I say. "I mean, I wasn't born in Portland. Not exactly."

"Where are you from?" she says, her eyes holding back the emotion that I already see on her face, fear and disappointment.

I tilt my head back and point towards the imaginary line past the bridge, past the islands. "There."

"An…Invalid," she says. "You're an…Invalid."

The word, like scrapping nails on a chalkboard. An invalid, a person who is a ghost person from their lives, a mistake for even being born.

"I've always hated that word," I say looking back at her. The look she shows is one of disgust. It is what over and I have lost the girl that I danced with yesterday. "I suppose…you believe in vampires and werewolves, too?"

Her breathing deepens, and finally her hand lets go of the buoy line and the wave takes her back to shore. I try to grab her, and she twists away from me.

"Don't," she says. "Don't you dare touch me."

"Lena, I swear. I didn't mean to hurt you. I didn't want to lie to you."

"Why are you doing this?" she says. "What do you want from me?"

"Want…?" I say shaking my head. It is clear she didn't know, she didn't feel the same way. It was a lie, I was reading the her wrong.

I place my hands on her shoulder, steadying her.

"Lena. I like you, okay? That's it. That's all. I like you," I say resigning to sharing my heart and letting her stomp on it, let her finally reject it.

The wave comes and finally she stumbles backwards, running back towards the shore.

"Lena!" I say over and over trying to get her to look back, but she doesn't, she moves forward. I start to move after her, but I know, that although I am not tired, something inside is broken, and I cannot muster the will to try and catch her.

I have lost her.


	11. Chapter 11

eleven

_Let them come._

It is the thought that I have repeat over and over in my mind. I stumble through the streets, forgetting everything that I am, everything that I should be. It is the first time that I trusted enough, loved enough to share myself with someone. The air doesn't come quickly enough, and I find my sucking more than what my body can handle. Is this the disease making its way through my body, could it be that they were right and love really is a manic disease. I don't even know what happens or how I even make it back to the highlands, but I do.

_Don't you dare touch me._

The words that broke everything, it was the look that she gave me. The same look that everyone else gives a person from the Wilds, the look of disgust, of a dog that has rabies and has to be put down in order for society to regain stability. Those eyes that can show me the warmth of a sun that I have never seen, now all I see is the disgust in her eyes, or worst, I can still see the disappointment.

_Let the cold night air take me to the next life._

It is the only thing that I can think of. The cold wild on the drench clothes, like death come and take me away. In the distance I think I can hear the sirens, the static of the walkie talkie fill my mind. Is it real, or is it just my fears coming to reality. I just lie there closing my eyes, the burning feeling of my eyes. Have I been crying? I don't remember anything. It feels like a hazy drugged day, not a dream or a nightmare, but the in betweens where you don't even know what is real, or not. I wish I could take it back, wish I could get in a time machine and go back a day or even go back three years and stop myself from coming. It was a mistake, Portland like every Zombieland has one thing in common, they take everything, they kill everyone, if not the body, and then from the inside, they take everything that you are. The longer you have been here the more of you is taken, the more you lose. I have to get out, I have to escape, and it is the only thing that I can think of as I drift off, my body obviously taken more than it can handle.

I mumble it as I fall asleep.

_I have to escape._

Darkness creeps in, the shadows take over and it happens in my mind over and over. Seeing it happen over and over from outside, seeing the pain of her trust being broken, the look of disgust, in slow motion. It feels like eternity, it feels like it loops over and over, that slow motion has stretched out and there is no end, to the look on her face.

The shivering of my body is what wakes me up, and as I feel the wood on my cheek, I know that yesterday happened. I grab the nearby blanket and cover myself, trying to get some sort of rhythm in my heart. The coldness of my body goes from the tip of my toes all the way to my hair. The shivering takes over everything, my thoughts cloudy, hazy, unable to focus, unable to see what the next step is.

It all comes back in an instant, like a headache from eating ice cream too fast. Closing my eyes, I see that I have to leave, it is time to escape. I have to push her out of my mind, the hurt has to be shoved into the closet of my mind, where the longing of love is, where the memories of my life in the Wilds live. I have to get out. Grabbing everything from the crawl space, something falls out and I look at it like it is a bomb.

The blue sharpie just lies there on the ground, staring at me. It is just a sharpie I say to myself, it isn't anything important. I lie to myself over and over, and say that it doesn't matter to me, but I know that before I go, I have to say goodbye. Even if they cannot say it back to me, or even want to, I have to anyways.

I grab the lighter and fumble to start a fire, the numbness of my fingers and toes, trying to warm myself, trying to bring back the life that was slowly being taken yesterday. It takes me a couple of hours, two I think, to finally be able to feel my finger tips. Looking outside I see that the world behind the fence has already woken up, and although I have tried to push her away from my mind, she keeps coming back.

_Lena._

I don't go back to the apartment, and I move from 37 Brooks to another house on another block. Everything inside of me screams to leave, but something or actually someone holds me back. I find myself keeping with the shadows, and alley ways. I keep my ear to the ground, hearing for anything about someone from the Wilds here in Portland. Nothing comes, and it is then that I believe that probably she won't say anything.

The good thing about working part-time at the labs is that you can always call to ask for time off to 'study.'

Everywhere I go, I try to keep myself from looking at the reflections of the store windows, to look at my reflection. It is the only way that I keep her from invading my thoughts, to move, to do something, anything. The seconds turn to minutes and then I can finally breathe without winching, the minutes turn to hours, and I can finally almost forget the words, and the look she gave me. It is only when the hours turned to days, that I realized that probably I am wrong about being here. It could be that I should have never come to Portland.

Grabbing the guard uniform, I think that if they are coming, this might buy me a little bit of time. It is dangerous I know, but I know what I have to do. The ball cap I wear lowly covering my eyes and make sure that my sunglasses cover my eyes.

I walk towards Monument Square, to a place where she might be, or might pass by. In my hand the small little folded paper that I wrote the night before. I know that it is a setback, but she deserve this at least, to know what I feel.

'_Lena, I'm so sorry. Please forgive me. Alex.'_

It is my way of saying goodbye, it is my way of trying to give back to her what I had stolen. The misconception of who I was. Give her back at least a good memory.

The trip down to the Crypts comes slowly, as I avoid all major roads, and take the alley ways and short cuts. From afar I think to myself how I can escape if I need to. The only thing that I can remember is that the Crypts are part of the border fence. One of the flaws of Portland, there fear of the diseased. They pushed the place where all the criminals and what they believed to be the crazies furthest away from everybody all the way to the border. The bad thing about that is that the Wilds are right behind the Crypts, easily to disappear if you can find a way out.

Walking towards the Crypts the only thing I can do is trust that Lena hasn't said anything, hasn't told anyone that I am from the outside. The steps feel like an eternity, and coming to the guard hut, I look to the sides making sure that no one is trying to surround me. The guard sees me from the glass and recognizes me immediately. Did Lena tell the hotline about me?

"Hey Warren," he says.

"Hey Peter," I say.

"You coming to see Thomas?" He says.

I nod and he opens the gate. The gate shutters to life and begins to move slowly. Waving to Peter, I walk towards the open gate, into the lions den. Once through I take the time and look around the courtyard. The square grey courtyard, drained of color, filled with rows and rows of small windows. Thinking of each one of those window a cell, with a person who has stood their ground, who has told society that they were not sick, or crazy, is one of those cells empty waiting for me. I shouldn't have come, I think to myself slowly coming to a stop in the middle of the courtyard. Looking behind me I see the gate finally closing behind me, and know that I am not trapped.

I hear the door buzzed and see Thomas walking towards me. He lifts his hand and meets me in the center of the courtyard.

"Everything okay?" he says.

I nod.

"Pretty day we are having," I say looking at him.

He puts his hands in his pocket and looks up.

"Yeah, should be a great day today, clear skies and all," he says and I know that it is safe, but for how long.

We walk towards the first wing, and then through the hallways, making our way to Ward Six. We don't talk as much, but we talk about each others day. Once I see it there in the distance, the small stone that has my father's name on it. Kneeling, right next to it, I grab the edge of my sleeve and pull it over my palm. Using it to wipe the stone I see it there stare at me, the one who the city of Portland Invalidated because he wanted to leave, wanted to have a life with the woman he loves.

I whisper, "Hey Dad."

Fighting back the tears that are coming up my eyes, I blink quickly to clear them out.

"Have to go back outside, but I wanted to tell you that I understand now, the feeling of loving someone," I say.

Thomas places a hand on my shoulder and I have to stand up. There is another guard walking towards us, through the courtyard, coming from the cells. Looking at him, I see the yellow band on his arm and I know that it is one of those guards that Thomas warned me about, an 'investigator.' That is the official title of the guard, but Thomas told me that is just code for the one who has the special skill set for torture.

We follow the guard out of Ward Six and to the hallway back to the safety of the Crypts. That thought causes me to let out a small laugh. Thomas looks over to me confused.

"What's the joke," he says.

"Oh nothing, just thinking about going on vacation," I say.

Going on vacation is code; it is code for an exit back to the resistance.

"Oh?" He says. "My boss would never give me approval for vacation, how did you do it?"

"I didn't," I say laughing. "That's the funny part."

This exchange to anyone who is listening would get it as a joke, but to Thomas who knows the codes of our conversation, it is as serious as an attack. This means that I am leaving, without authorization of the rebellion.

"I forgot something inside, walk with me?" he says.

Walking with me go through the courtyard and into the cells. I have never been in the actual cells; Thomas told me that it really wasn't the best idea to go through it. He opens the door and the smell is enough to bring anyone to their knees. The odor of feces is so strong that my body's immediate reaction is to gag.

"What the hell did you forget?" I say. "A gas mask?"

He smiles.

"You know a couple of years ago, I almost went on vacation," he says spreading his hands. "A nice relaxing vacation, to the crystal blue waters of the beach, had it all planned out."

"Last minute, there were some complications, someone needed the day off and I couldn't leave, had to cover the shift," he says. "Never did get another shot, lost a good friend of mine in the process," he says looking towards the end of the hallway. His face goes from a smile to a sadness that I know all too well.

Complications, someone else needed the day off, is code that I haven't heard of, but I can make it out. The plan to escape didn't go as plan, and someone else needed help.

We stop in front of a door; it reads on the top '118.'

"One of our earliest member of Ward Six, and the one that has held out the longest," he says. "To think I had to cover a transport to bring in this inmate all those years ago, she was the reason I never did make that vacation."

Looking inside I see a small cell and a mountain of clothes in the corner. The light shines on it, and I realize that it moved, the mountain of clothes. Wait, I say to myself squinting my eyes trying to focus.

It is a person etching something on the walls.

"She does that everyday, over and over," he says. "You should see the walls and the ceilings; she carved in it one word over and over."

"With what?" I say. "Her hand?"

He nods no.

"She has this small silver charm that looks like a cross that she uses it," he says. "Sort of like a writing tool, had it around her neck. She screamed so loudly the first night she was here, because…they took it from her, that they gave it back to her."

We start to walk back towards the front gate. He doesn't say much, and much of his happiness from a moment ago has left. We stop in the courtyard and I look around to see if anyone was around us.

I whisper.

"Who was that woman?" I say.

"My friend's mother," he says. "I lost her, and well I look after her mother. Waiting for the right time, who knows those blue waters look so calm. One day."

He looks down and then we walk towards the gate that is beginning to open. I place my hands inside and realize that just like Lena, Thomas is doing the honorable thing, looking after his friend that he was going to the Wilds with, going to escape. I know that there is only one reason he would, it is the same reason I was going to.

Once we are outside, the only thing I can do is shake his hand.

"What was the word?" I ask.

He looks confused as if he doesn't know what I am talking about.

"The word that she wrote over and over again in the cell," I say.

He looks back to the Crypts, and then up to the sky looking at the afternoon sky. It is a beautiful day and well from here you can just barely see the large wall that separate the Wilds from Portland.

"The disease," he says. "She wrote the one word of the disease, over and over and over again."

He turns and walks back towards the Crypts, towards the cells. It is not a prison for him; it is a place where he still shows the woman he lost that he still loves her.

The bike ride I take is now just to think, to think about what to do next. It isn't easy, I thought after all these time, that it would be, just to jump over the fence and never look back. Thomas couldn't do it then, and he had the chance. He lost her, means she got cured and isn't the same.

Making one last stop before I go, I see Bolt sitting on the steps to the apartment complex. He has been reading a book, or at least pretending, he always told me he hated any printed word that can steal your soul.

"Hey man," he says standing. "You have been M.I.A. from work and the hangouts."

"Yeah, man had to study," I say. "School has been kicking my butt."

He looks up and nods understanding that sometimes we need to disappear, to fall off the grid. It is what keeps us sane, to know that we can, and that it would be okay to do so. If there is one thing the rebellion does well, is they have learned to be patience and strike when the opportunity is prime.

"I heard on the news, that it might rain tonight," he says as a fore thought. "Even heard of some lightning."

I nod and he gives me a wave as he begins to retreat back up the street, whistling some tune that he must have gotten off of L.A.M.M. To anyone else that might be walking the sidewalks he seems like a normal guy, no one you would suspect to be a sympathizer. It is weird, that there are many of them in the city, and yet no movement has ever been organized. They are stay there and wait, but really not knowing that the whole time the city is taking something from them slowly.

Walking up the stairs to the second floor, I see Blaine coming down the hallway. Every time he tours the apartments of the university is to give out his ads, his party ads.

"Hey you coming tonight," he says. "The same thing, but even better man."

I look at him and nod no. The lightning Bolt mentioned is a code for raid. Tonight is going to be a raid night and being outside on a raid night is asking for trouble. That is the last thing I need, the last thing I want.

"Aw, come on man," he says. "Lookit, I even invited that girl you like."

I turn and walk back to him. He smiles and puts up his hands like in triumph.

"I knew it," he says. "I knew you like that chick from the other day."

"What the hell are you talking about?" I say angrily. "I am paired man, I have no feeling for any girl."

"You mean you weren't scoping that pretty blonde from the other time," he says. "in the alley. Man I know I saw you there lurking. It is cool, man, I won't say anything."

He places a finger on his lips.

I push him out and he tumbles down to the ground.

"Damn meth heads," I say loudly. "I am not interested."

Walking back to my room, I hear him yell out some obscenity that I cannot understand. Closing the door, I can feel my breathing shorten. The blonde from the alley. He must have seen me that day when Lena's friend was grabbing an invite.

Just like that, it happens. The days become hours, and I see her in my mind. The hours become minutes and I can now hear her laughter as she ran after me towards the buoys. The minutes become seconds and I can feel her hand in mine again.

_Lena._


	12. Chapter 12

twelve

The only thing that goes through my mind is that tonight is a raid night, and there is a strong possibility that Lena might be there. I haven't been going to these things, and probably I wouldn't go to this one either, but the idea of her being caught by the regulators in an underground party is enough to cause me to forget the plan of leaving.

I will leave after, after the raid. It will be easy to spot them; they yell it from the road. They have these walkie talkies that scream in the distance. You can actually spot them a mile away, if it wasn't for the loud music.

A shirt and a pair of jeans, some shoes that I don't even know if they are from the same pair, and I am off running down the street. Looking at my watch, I think, the party would have already started. The new moon will make it hard to hide, but it will create shadows.

The only thing that I have going for me, is that the party is in the highlands. It is the one place that I know like the back of my hand. I spent most of my life in them, almost explored every house back when I first came to Portland. It was my way of keeping the Wilds alive in my mind. We would do that as kids back then, go into the abandoned houses and shopping centers and pretend that we were explorers from a time forgotten. Our job would be to try and decipher what the people were like. It was stupid but it did past the time, it made us forget about where we were, and what we had to live on.

I can hear it. In the distance, I hear the yelling of the regulators.

_Raid, raid. This is a raid. Please do as you are commanded. _

My breath is caught up in my lungs, not passing through my mouth or my nose. For a moment I am statue, for a moment I cannot think of anything but her. A flash of her face just as I turn around in the water to see her laughing, it is the thought that comes to me, and it is where freeze it, the movie of her. I sneak through the alley to the nearby corner, and peek around. The raid party is coming into a neighborhood, it isn't near the highlands. I wait for a little bit letting them go into the neighborhood before turning the corner and jog to the next street. My fists squeeze tighter, trying to drive away the invisible doubt, the shadow of fear. I am going to make it. My steps echo as I run through the streets, only matched by the beating of my heart.

_I have to make it._

I don't know if I am not paying attention, or if I am running the fastest I have ever, but the houses blur and it is like nothing can stop me from getting there. I can finally understand it, the thought of freedom as you run faster and faster. It is like the thoughts just get pushed away.

I hear the booming in the distance, the music. I want to yell from here to shut down the music. Will they hear me?

I move slowly now, and then I hear it, the walkies, and it isn't far away now, it is close, real close. If I can hear the music from here, they must hear it as well. I move through a nearby house and then to the backyard.

_Two houses away._

I can see the party is still going. I am at the wooden fence, and I stop myself.

_What if she isn't there? What if she doesn't want to see me?_

I want to shout, but nothing comes out, it is almost as if I have lost my voice. There is a knot in my throat that doesn't want to go away. My feet now feel like lead and it is the one thing that I hadn't thought of.

_Does she even want me there?_

What am I doing? She may not even be there, and if she is, she probably doesn't want me there. She hasn't made any effort to see me, and yet I have done nothing but think about her all the time. Every day, I passed by the Governor to find nothing in his hand, no response.

It is then that I hear it. Almost as if I could have remembered it, and held it secretly in my heart for this moment.

…_Crazy stuff gets stranded on the sand…just gets left behind when the water goes out…_

Closing my eyes, I see it, the same horizon, I can hear the waves, and feel the whispers of the wind. It is different though, there isn't that itch of fear in the air, that anytime a regulator would stop us from talking. I can hear it, in the distance the seagulls, and I see her there, her knees up to her chest, her arms wrapped around them.

"I will not leave you," I tell her. Finally she turns to me and smiles. A dog barking.

I blink twice at her, and think, 'there was no dog at the beach that day.' I blink and I am back in front of the wooden fence. The dog, I hear the barking and everything goes from slow motion to very fast.

I am up and over, and there the house stands, and I see the kids running, the flashlights litter the house.

"Raid," one kid tell me as he runs away.

I am in the open window in the back and then in a small room where I find some of them hiding.

"Go," I tell them. "There are not in the back. Jump the fence and through the house. It will get you to the main road."

They won't move. I kneel next to the girl that is frightened.

"If you don't leave," I say. "They will grab you, and then you will be thrown into the Crypts. Do you want that?"

Her eyes finally flick and then focus on mines. She nods no.

"Good," I say. "The window behind you. Go through it, and then over the fence."

She stands and does what I just told her. In the floor there where she was lays a long metal pipe. Picking it up I feel it and walk over to the door. I slowly turn the knob and open the door. The darken hallway is suddenly filled with a light, and footsteps.

I turn back into the room, the flashlight dances on the ceiling and I know that someone is coming…running. It is then that I see the flashlight pickup someone who turns back. In the doorway, it is then I see her. The light of the flashlight, lights up the eyes that I just saw in my memory.

"Stop!" I hear someone yell from behind.

The dog brushes past the doorway. I tighten my hand around the lead pipe and rush into the hallway behind the regulator. I lift my hand and swing down at the regulator head. I miss and hit the dog instead.

The dog lets Lena go, and as I rush pass the regulator I push him down to the ground. He grunts and lets out words that I miss.

Putting my arm around her waist, I whisper.

"This way."

We are through the hallway and into the servant's quarters. This house was one of the first ones that I explored. Mapped out the hallways and secret hiding places, just in case if the crap hit the fan and I had to make a quick exit.

The end of the hall is a room with no windows. The servant's room for these houses never had windows. It is one of the things I noticed in all these houses. They all have the servant's rooms in the downstairs near the kitchen, near the laundry, near everything that they needed in order to do their jobs.

This house was one of my favorites. Inside the servant's room of this particular house has a false wall. I never could figure out why they needed a false wall, but I found it once when I was cooking here. Learned that day that you need a window in order to cook, or the fumes would kill you just as quick. The fumes escaping those cracks of the wall…well it was what saved me that day, and now it is what will save us.

I hear him in the background, banging into the walls and the crap on the ground. Pushing the wall, I turn and whisper.

"Up."

I help her onto the window sill and then finally she is out. She is okay. I follow her through the open window and fall onto the ground. I walk through the woods of the back of the house and find her there looking for me. The moonlight, the way it catches her face, is so beautiful and yet dangerous tonight.

I catch up to her and grab her hand. She doesn't flinch and she doesn't pull away, but trusts me enough to lead her away. I cut through the woods and then finally see the tool shed. It is where I have been stocking up medical supplies.

"In here," I say her.

She moves into the tool shed. She lets out a gag reflex. It must be the dog urine that I soaked a towel in. It is the only way to throw off our scent, something that I learned from Gabriel one day. Although Beatrice knew the ins and outs of Portland, Gabriel knows how to prepare for the worst. He would tell me always that when I found supplies, especially medical to always have them in stash houses in locations north, south, east, and west.

I grab the towel and wedge it under the door.

"God," she says, holding a hand over her mouth.

"This way the dogs won't pick up our scent," I say to her softly.

She stands there and for the first time, I see the frailty of her. I had always seen her as a strong person, but at this moment she stands there almost as if she is about to pass out. That is when I look down and see the blood trickling from her foot. She wobbles a little bit and I reach out to steady her.

"Sit down," I say.

She lowers herself down, placing a hand on the wall of the shed. The pain in her face and I know that I have to take a look at it to see how bad it is.

"I am going to take a look at your leg, okay?" I say. She nods and I reach out and pull her leg to me. The whole pant leg is drench in blood and I know that it will not be good. I begin to roll up the pants judging her reaction as I go to see how much pain she is in. She just looks at me and doesn't flinch, but continues to breathe in deeply. Once I am at her knee, I place my hand on her soft warm skin and roll her ankle to one side exposing the wound.

The gash is long and deep. It isn't good, but probably if I clean the wound, I can stop it from being infected.

"Is it bad?" she asks.

"Hold still," I say. Looking to my left I see the first aid kit that I hand placed in here. Opening it, I see the glass bottle of alcohol. I have to clean and kill any bacteria. The worst thing that can happen is that it gets infected. The only good thing about taking classes at the University is the fact that we have to take a basic first aid class. I think that is probably the only time that I actually pay attention.

'Now lacerations or cuts to those who are not taking these classes, are dangerous, anyone can tell me why?' Professor Jameson asks.

The whole class goes silent and you can hear a pin drop. Although I know the answer, everyone tells me to keep a low profile, to become forgettable, part of the masses.

'Seems like no one knows this answer,' he says. 'Disappointing, but it is because of infection, and not the cut itself.'

Looking at it, I remember the diagram of the muscles, the gastrocnemius muscle. It has only one vein and two nerves. The problem could be if the dog bite nicks the posterior tibial vein. I run my hand cupped alongside the interior feeling for the bone. Finally finding the break in-between the gastrocnemius and the soleus major I realize that the bite didn't nick it.

"This is going to burn for a second," I say as I pour out a little bit of alcohol on the calf, and see the cut more easily. The jerk motion and immediately I extend my hand.

She grips it and tightens around it, holding in her breath. After a couple seconds, the tightening loosens and I can tell that she was able to withstand the pain of the alcohol.

"What is that?" She asks.

"Rubbing alcohol," I say. "Prevents infection."

"How did you know it was here?" she asks.

"Shit," I say. "You're really bleeding."

Looking down I see the blood now, dark and still coming out. It is not stopping. A new fear runs through my mind, I don't know if she feels it if it nick it, then we have to get her to a hospital as soon as possible. Keeping her from going into shock, and what was that other thing.

I close my eyes, and think. I can feel my heart beat quicken, and my breathing shallow.

'Come on, Alex,' I say over and over. 'Think!'

"It doesn't even hurt that much,"

Hurt? It is then that I remember. Something about the nerve, it allows you to feel. If she can feel hurt, then it means that the nerve is sending the signal to her brain. I reach down and feel the bottom of her calf. She jerks back and I let out a sigh of relief.

I tug at my shirt and then over my head. Ripping strips of cloth and I begin to work the pressure around the wound. Looking up I see her eyes close and then open much more slowly. I have to keep her alert, have to keep her from passing out.

"Hey," I say touching her shoulder. "You okay?"

She smiles. "Fine." The smile turns into a giggle. "You're naked."

"What?" I say trying to understand her to see if she was going into deliria.

"I've never seen a boy like – like that. With no shirt on. Not up close."

Her face turns red, and I know that she is okay. Finishing up with the bandages I see that the bleeding has lessened and I can finally take it easy.

_She is safe. _

I grab her leg and slowly place it on the ground.

"Okay?" I say to her.

She nods.

It is like my heart can finally rest. Looking at her though I think of the past couple of weeks and all I want to do is apologize. All I want to do is tell her how much she means to me. Pushing aside the fear that has crept back in, I close my eyes and finally just spit out what I have wanted to say for days now.

"Listen, Lena. What happened at the beach – I'm really sorry. I should have told you sooner, but I didn't want to frighten you away."

"You don't have to explain," she says leaning back towards the wall.

"But I want to explain. I want you to know that I didn't mean to -"

"Listen," she interrupts me. "I'm not going to tell anyone, okay? I'm not going to get you in trouble or anything."

It isn't about that. Telling the regulator are the least of my concerns. My heart just cannot help but tell her. Something about her, that I cannot control myself. All the walls finally come down and I am there, the little boy standing in the rain.

"I don't care about that," I say. It is the truth. "I just don't want you to hate me."

Her head turns and looks towards the door. I can barely hear it come from her mouth, but it is like a song that you whisper to someone who is about to sleep.

"Why do you care?" she says.

"I told you," I respond in kind. "I like you."

"You don't know me," she says immediately.

"I want to, though." I say. It is almost as if I am not thinking. Honestly I think my mind has finally shut off, and now all that comes from my mouth is from my heart.

"Why me?" she says finally looking at me. "I'm nobody…"

It is that thought. She doesn't realize how special she is, how unique she is. I wish I could just show her how beautiful she is. How her eyes just look like burning fire, and her voice sounds like as sweet as a child song lullaby.

"I was born in the Wilds. My mother died right afterward; my father's dead. He never knew he had a son. I lived there for the first part of my life, just kind of bouncing around. All the other…_invalids_ took care of me together. Like a community thing."

I take a deep breath. I have never told anyone my life, if she wants to know who I am, I will tell her.

"I came into Portland when I was ten, to join up with the resistance here. I won't tell you how. It was complicated. I got an ID number; I got a new last name, a new home address. There are more of us than you think – Invalids, and sympathizers, too – more of us than anybody knows. We have people in the police force, and all the municipal departments. We have people in the labs, even."

She looks at me, and can see that it is too much for her to process.

"My point is that it's possible to get in and out. Difficult, but possible. I moved in with two strangers – sympathizers, both of them – and was told to call them my aunt and uncle. I didn't care. I'd never known my real parents, and I'd been raised by dozens of different aunts and uncles. It didn't make a difference to me."

The pain of remember, it is enough to cause me to stop. I still remember how she shared the deepest part of her, and I couldn't, because I felt like she would reject me. The thing that I didn't realize is, that she rejected what society told her was a lie. I want her to see me for me.

"I hated it here. I hated it here so much you can't even imagine. All the buildings and the people looking so dazed and the smells and the closeness of everything and the rules – rules everywhere you turned, rules and walls, rules and walls. I wasn't used to it. I felt like I was in a cage. We _are_ in a cage: a bordered cage."

I ball up my fist, and I can feel the anger rising up inside me.

"At first I was angry. I used to light things on fire. Paper, handbooks, school primers. It make me feel better somehow. I even burned my copy of _The Book of Shhh."_ I say laughing.

"I used to walk along the borders for hours every day. Sometimes I cried." Looking down, I realize how I hated them, the people of this city for making me feel like this.

"After a while, though, I would just walk. I liked to watch the birds. They would lift off from our side and soar over into the Wilds, as easily as anything. Back and forth, back and forth, lifting and curling through the air. I could watch them for hours at a time. Free: They were totally free. I'd thought that nothing and nobody was free in Portland, but I was wrong. There were always the birds."

The thought of the birds, the image of them soaring through the air, it reminds me how chained up I became, how much of myself was lost here in Portland. Through the years and through the drabness of everything, everything just took a little bit of me away. It was that day, the day I visited my father, it reminds of the chains around my heart and how my father never got to feel totally free.

"The first time I saw you, at the Governor, I hadn't been to watch the birds at the border in years. But that's what you reminded me of. You were jumping up and you were yelling something, and your hair was coming loose from y our ponytail, and you were so _fast…_just a flash and then you were gone. Exactly like a bird."

I turn and see her eyes meet mines. I sit next to her and just staring at the door of the tool shed, I feel like we are back in the sand of the coast. It is like I almost got a second chance to do it all over again.

"Everyone is asleep. They've been asleep for years. You seemed…awake." I say whispering to her. I close my eyes, and feel the weight of this world, of the rebellion. I am just so tired, and I want to soar through the air, like we did when we danced.

"I'm tired of sleeping."

I hear her say, "no."

"Why?" I say. "What are you afraid of?"

"You have to understand. I just want to be happy." She says and I can see her eyes behind to hold back the emotions that her body wants to feel. "I just want to be normal, like everybody else."

"Are you sure that being like everybody else will make you happy?" I say. It is the only thing that I have noticed. She was made to stand out, she was made to not fit in. I see her in a crowd and she shines out like a bright star.

"I don't know any other way," she says close to my ear.

"Let me show you," I say lightly placing my lips on hers. Closing my eyes, I feel the electricity run through my heart, and through my body. It is like everything goes quiet again, and everything just falls away. Everybody disappears from my mind, the whole thing, the rebellion, Portland, even this shed, all I feel, all I see, is her. My heart sings and I hear the song in her lips.

My hand runs through her hair. The soft tangles of every strain, feel like waves through my finger tips. I feel her hand on my chest, and can feel her heart beat through her kiss. It is an amazing feeling almost as if I am not really here, and yet I feel everything, every inch of my body comes alive. My breathing becomes her breathing; my heart beat becomes her heart beat. In this moment, I understand everything, I understand what love is, and why it is so powerful.

Finally pulling away, it feels almost surreal, and almost as if everything in my life has led to this moment, and for this moment. Almost as if I have found a piece of me that I didn't even know was missing.

She looks at me with a look that I can only wish to keep imprinted in my mind. It is the one look I wish to see every day, and for every moment of my life.

"I really like you, Lena. Do you believe me?"

"Yes."

"Can I walk you home?"

"Yes."

"Can I see you tomorrow?"

"Yes."

It is all that I need to make me realize, that I cannot leave, that I could have never left. It was the one thing, she was that one thing that held me from leaving, calling me through the night, through my dreams.

I stand and with my hand in hers I lift her up and embrace her there in the shed. She feels so light and I feel so strong, who would ever know that love could make you feel invincible. It isn't a drug, it isn't anything but a drug, and for one I cannot get enough.

Walking with her, everything feels different. Portland looks different now, almost as if we left the old Portland and came to the one that she told me about, where there no disease and there was just love.

Every chance I get, every dark shadow that I find, I pull her into me, and kiss her softly. I feel her hands in mine, almost as a dance, we become one and all I wish was that time would slow down or stop for an eternity.

There is a break in my heart, when she tells me.

"This is my house."

Sadness covers me and all I can say.

"Tomorrow?"

She nods, and her hand lingers in mines, and I know that she doesn't want to let go. I finally lessen the grip and she does the same, and like that I see her walk to her door, take a quick glance behind her shoulder and close the door behind her.


	13. Chapter 13

thirteen

_They shimmer brightly,_

_They pulse with delight,_

_They burn in the dark sky,_

_Looking down on us tonight_

Staring at the black long hand striking the twelve, there is only one thing that I can think of. Be care what you wish for, you just might get it. There are exactly sixty seconds in one minute, and sixty minutes in one hour, and so many hours left before I can see her again.

'Exactly seven hours to go, or if you like to be tortured, four hundred and twenty minutes to go, or truly something that I never want to think about, but it is exactly twenty five thousand two hundred seconds to go.'

_Tick, tock, tick tock, all day long looking at this dumb looking clock. _

Why does time go so slowly, why is it an eternity until it is over. It is the only thing that keeps me from going crazy here in at the labs, that in only, six hours and fifty minutes; I will get to see her again. Smiling at myself, thinking that I should have never made that wish.

'_I wish that time would slow down, or freeze altogether, so that I can be with her forever.'_

Who would have thought that the universe would grant this wish and forget the '_with her' _part, some cruel joke I guess. Cannot think clearly, cannot focus on anything but the time. Even when it is my turn to walk the grounds, I take my time and stop in places that I saw her. I make my way up to the observation deck again, and just sit there for a couple of minutes looking down at the empty examination room.

It was the first place I heard her voice. The way it whispered through the words, unsure, until she started to talk about her mother, there is a soft quality about it. The only thing that makes time go faster, is thinking about her. Trying to remember every word she said, and how she said it.

Walking back from the shed.

"Aren't you afraid that there are still regulators out?" She says to me.

"Come here," I say pulling her to a nearby corner. "What do you hear?"

She turns and looks up to the night sky. For a couple of seconds there is nothing.

"Nothing," she says.

"You have nothing to fear now," I say holding her hand, leaning in to kiss her. Her hand reaches up and runs through my hair. Pressed against the wall of an old strip mall, we kiss in the alleyway.

"Is this a dream?" she asks me.

"I don't know," I say. "If it is, please do me a favor and do not wake me up."

She lets out a small giggle and then smiles.

"What?" I say.

"I have to be here tomorrow in the morning," she says. "I help my Uncle out at this Stop-N-Save."

I look up and see the cross streets 'Congress Avenue and Lafayette.'

"That's nice," I say.

"Not really," she says laughing.

"So I guess that I won't be able to see you tomorrow?" I say realizing that Lena will be working tomorrow.

"Well I get off at Six," she says.

"Great," I say smiling. "I can finally show you the sunset over at Back Cove. I mean if you want."

She nods and we continue to walk on Congress. The whole night is still, and everyone is probably sleeping at this time, so I swing our cupped hands together playfully, not wishing for it to break.

"Hey Warren."

I look up and see the next shift already at the hut.

"Everything quiet?" He asks.

I nod and picking up my stuff, I try with all my might to hold back the joy. Walking over to the locker rooms, I change out of my uniform and put on my beach clothes.

Grabbing the bike, I pedal through the streets zigging and zagging through the streets of Portland which is bustling with life. It is after all, the summer time, and most of the evidence of the raid has been washed away. Garbage cans have been placed back neatly on the sidewalk. It is like nothing happened yesterday; the whole thing was swept under the rug.

The store comes into view. I place my bike on the nearby corner and walk towards a car that is parked on the street. Well it really isn't a car, but the shell of it. It does have one thing that I need a mirror. I look at it and fix my hair just that I at least look like I didn't sleep in.

Looking at my watch.

'1:00 PM.'

Think it would be too early to see her? I think to myself. Smiling at the mirror, I come up with the genius plan with going shopping for the beach.

From the outside I see her there behind the counter sitting on a stool. Her hands on her chin, looking straight into the back of the store; I touch the door and finally push in.

She turns and immediately almost falls off the stool. I smile at her and walk towards one of the aisles. I grab the first thing I see.

'Cauliflower soup'

"Hmm, this looks delicious," I say holding up the can and catch her cup her mouth holding back her laugh. Putting it back, I grab the bag of chips, and a pack of gum. She looks at me and I move my glances to her every five seconds. I only wish that we were alone, but just seeing her and my heart start to beat this wild drumming beat. After grabbing a root beer, I walk back to her. I smile as she looks at me with the same soft eyes from yesterday.

"Will that be all?" She says.

I nod. "That's all."

She lingers there counting the change for the five dollar bill that I gave her. As she hands it to me, I feel her hand on mines, and I wish I could just hold it there in mines for a while, but I know that I can't.

I pick up the bag and begin to walk to the door.

"Have a great day," she says to me.

"Oh, I will." I say. "I'm going to the Cove."

It is a drug, because just that little moment, and I am okay for a couple of hours. Just to hear her voice and now my heart can be calm, my breathing can be deep and controlled.

"Hey!" I hear from behind. I turn around and see her coming up behind me. "I gave you the wrong change."

Smiling she leans in.

"You shouldn't have come," she says pressing nothing in my hand. "I told you I'd meet you later."

I put my hand in my pocket pretending to place money in there.

"I couldn't wait." I say truthfully, although not the whole truth. I couldn't really tell her, that all I could think about was her, that I couldn't focus at work, and finally couldn't take it and had to see her.

I lift my finger to her and waggle it in front of her, pretending to tell her that it is unacceptable.

"There's a blue door around the corner, in the alley," she says raising her hands to apologize. "Meet me there in five. Knock four times."

"Listen, I'm really sorry. Like I said, it was an honest mistake."

She turns and walks back. I notice that she limping and can't help to wish that she wasn't that the dog didn't sink its teeth into her. I look down to my watch and make a note to walk to the alley in five minutes. My eyes cannot tear away from the door to the store.

The longest five minutes of my life.

"Excuse me," I hear a stern loud voice say.

I turn and immediately my heart starts to beat just a little bit quicker.

"Looking a little bit too focused on that store," the regulator says. "Any particular reason why?"

I start to say something, and then finally my mind kicks in.

"Think I might have forgotten to get something from there," I say. "Going to the Cove."

"ID card," he says sternly.

I reach to my wallet and pull out my card. As I open the backpack I can tell that he notices my lab security card. He looks at it closely, and I always had the confidence that all of my identity cards were backed up because they were made by sympathizers that are in the C.O.R.E. building.

"You work as security?" He says.

"Yes," I say. "You know how it is, the grin of the job, the pressure of everything. Today is the only day I get a half-day to go to enjoy the afternoon."

He nods, and hands me the card.

I watch him walk to the end of Lafayette and onto Cumberland. Once he turns the corner, I make my way across the street and in the service entrance. It is a small one car entry driveway, squeeze in between two strip store front businesses. There are empty crates and homes right behind the businesses. These small businesses are meant for the neighborhood and for the prominent Munjoy Hill residents, I guess they allow Lena's uncle to make enough money to take care of them.

I walk around the corner and finally come to the blue door. I knock four times lowly and wait. Then after a couple of second I knock again and wait. Reaching out at the door knob, I turn and see that it isn't locked. Probably she left it unlocked so I didn't have to wait outside. Poking my head inside, I call out to her.

"Lena?"

Just then I see her there, standing, with Hana her friend. I freeze, unsure of what I should do, unsure of what to say. Looking over to Lena, it looks like she doesn't know either. The moment is finally broken with Lena complaining.

"You're late."

I say, "I got stopped by patrol. Had to show my cards," just as Hana says "You told him to meet you?"

Hana looks at me.

"Come inside, and shut the door."

I do and there I feel awkward, almost as if I don't know what to do or say, or how to even act. I mean I have met Hana before, but never really like this, or actually I have never let her see me like this, the real me.

Hana folds her arms and looks at Lena.

"Lena Ella Haloway Tiddle," she says accusatory. "You have some explaining to do."

I look at her, and say, "Your middle name is Ella?"

They both look at me with the meanest eyes I have ever seen, and the only thing I can do is butt out of this conversations. Her hands go to down and she begins to rub them. I have noticed that she does this whenever she is nervous. Her voice goes low and she stutters in between words.

"Um," she starts and then stops. "Hana, you remember Alex."

"Oh, I _remember_ Alex. What I don't remember is why Alex is _here."_

"He…well, he was going to drop off…" she stops and then looks towards me. It isn't easy to think of a story if you never do it. I do it for survival; I do it because I have to, sometimes though you lose yourself in these lies. It is important to me that she doesn't lie to her friend.

"Tell her," I say.

She takes a deep breath and then finally starts. "Well I bumped into Alex at the party over at Roaring Brook Farms, you know when I was leaving, and well we got to talking, he made me see that the parties were just about music and nothing bad was really going on." She smiles at me, and continues. "Well we met up at East End Beach. Hana have you ever run into the harbor?"

Now you can really tell she is nervous, she is just talking and not really thinking about it.

"Well, Alex told me about life outside…" she pauses, and I know what is coming. Hana looks at me, and then back to Lena, like unsure about what she means about the word 'outside.'

"Alex wasn't born here, he came from the Wilds, he is an…" she winches and says the word. "Invalid."

Hana looks at me with her eyes wide, almost the same as Lena did that day at the beach. She doesn't freak out though, she just looks at me as if I am a weird sight, almost as if I wasn't really there and she wants to touch me to see if I am real or not.

"Well I came last night to warn you about the raids, but I was too late, Hana, I was chased by a regulator, a dog bit me and well he saved me. We hid in a shed that smelled like dog piss and well…"

She stops and then looks at me.

"So you were there? You were there last night?" Hana says looking down. Then she shakes her head and continues, "I can't believe that. I can't believe you snuck out during a raid…for me."

"Yeah, well," Lena says.

Just then a knock on the door and Hana pushes me at the door which now has swung up. I hold my breath in as the door comes pressed against my hands. Through the crack of the door I see that it is the guy shelving items out in the aisles.

"Lena? Are you in there?" the man says. "What are you doing in there?"

Hana moves over to where Lena is.

"Hi, Jed, I just came by to give Lena something. And we started gossiping," she says cheerfully.

"We have customers," Jed says.

"I'll be out in a second," Lena responds. The door finally releases and closes behind.

We all look at each other relieved that he didn't catch me in here. She is right next to me now, and Hana stands in front of us. My pinky touches her hand, and she doesn't flinch but welcomes it. Turning to face her, she looks at me and it is almost as if Hana has disappeared.

"I brought some things for your leg," I say putting down the backpack. I take out everything that I had grabbed early this morning from the labs first aid kit: peroxide, bacitracin, bandages, adhesive tape, and cotton balls. I kneel in front of her, "Can I?"

She kneels down and starts to roll up her pant leg. Once it is up to her knee, I start to remove the strips of shirt that has been washed. It is a good thing that she has cleaned it. The wound has finally started to heal, the redness around the wound is clear indication that there has been no infection and that blood is flowing freely.

"Damn, Lena," Hana says. "That dog got you good."

"She'll be fine," I say without turning my back. Grabbing the tube of peroxide, I hear Hana say.

"Maybe you should go to the hospital."

I turn around on my knees and look at her.

'And tell them what? That she got hurt during a raid on an underground party?"

I turn back and clean the wound with peroxide which will help the healing process along.

"It doesn't hurt that bad," Lena says and I know that she is lying. The fact that when I put the bacitracin on her skin, she flinches and I know that it hurts to turn. Once the crème is in the wound track, I try to get the gauze out and find that my hands are slippery with the crème.

Hana kneels next to me and grabs the gauze from my hands.

"You're doing it wrong," she says. "My cousin's a nurse. Let me."

Moving to one side, I can tell that she cares a lot for her friend, and well she doesn't have crème on her hands.

"Yes ma'am," I say standing with my hands up. Looking at Lena I wink at her. She finally lets out a laugh which causes Hana to stand and look at me and then at Lena. It is pretty silly, we are in this little storeroom, we almost got caught by Jed and now we are fighting to put on gauze.

Once we stop, Hana points to the calf.

"See," she says at me. "Hey aren't you going to school for this?"

I let out a smirk and then Lena is rolling her pant leg down and then ushering us outside.

"Six, okay?" she says to both of us.

"Okay, okay," Hana says and the blue door closes.

Hana just looks at me, and then finally smiles. We walk through the alley and then just before we come back onto Lafayette, she stops me.

"You hurt her, and that bite would be a lot worst on you," she whispers hitting me on the arm.

"I promise I won't," I say rubbing my arm laughing.

"Good," she says starting to run down to Cumberland. Hana Tate, Lena's good friend is protective and I know that she means well. We both care about Lena very much and every effort that I have will be to never leave her.

I turn the opposite direction and walk back to my bike that I had left on the fence across the street. Riding down to Back Cove, it is a nice ride, and even more so when it is already six and I see them both coming up to the entrance of the park.

Seeing her there walking towards me, down the boardwalk near the railing, brings a smile to my face. I stand there leaning against the railing when both of join me. I let out a smile, and can see from the corner of my eye that she smiles right back. My right hand grips the railing, and there I feel someone's finger grip my pinky and I smile.

"Talk about a beautiful sight," I say tapping on her pinky. "I could spend everyday, just looking and admiring it."

I look to the side, and see no one is around us. Turning to face her, she finally smiles.

"Sorry about earlier," I say.

"It is okay," she says. "I mean I did give you the wrong change."

"I didn't know if you guys wanted something to eat," I say to both her and Hana. "The food truck at the entrance makes the best cheese steak sandwiches."

"Really," Hana says. "Well come on Lena, I'll split one with you."

"Oh..okay," she say turning around to Hana. They begin to walk back towards the entrance, when Lena stops turns around and kisses me. It is the first time that she has been the one to initiate a kiss. After a second or so, she separates and tells me, "been waiting all day."

"Same here," I say walk behind her as she runs to catch up to Hana who is now there waiting for her up the path. It the end to the most perfect day, to think about her in the morning and be with her in the afternoon, it makes everyday bearable here in Zombieland.

Today was just perfect.


	14. Chapter 14

fourteen

"You know you have…four freckles on your nose?" I say looking closely at her. The thing that I realized is that everyday that I spend with Lena, I find new things to find beautiful about her. Today, I think I will focus on the freckles on her nose. The way you can't really see it from afar but if you are close enough, you can see the four small spots on the tip.

She wrinkles her nose and starts to laugh.

"I didn't know," she says. "Just been looking at myself in the mirror for years now."

She has gotten so comfortable with me, that I have found she is always making me laugh. We spend most of our days if not all, together. Sometimes Hana comes with us, and sometimes it is just us. Our favorite places are the places where we can be ourselves and not have to worry about everyone around us, or being caught by anyone.

"Can I try something," I say.

She looks at me unsure if she should say yes or not. After a couple of second she nods. I smile a little, and then lean in to kiss her. Her eyes close just as I am a couple of inches from her. She smells so delicious and she looks so beautiful. I cup her face in my hands and slowly lower her face kissing her freckles lightly. Her hands lift to meet mine and then as I pull away she leans in and kisses me again.

She lets out a laugh and then opens her eyes.

"You are trying to distract me," she says pushing away from me. She sits back down on the blanket that I had placed on the ground. The scrabble board stands there waiting for her to go.

It is early in the afternoon and today I didn't have to work. We had decided to meet up after Lena's short shift today and of course I couldn't wait to see her.

"Hmmm," she says putting up her finger to her mouth. Finally she grabs some tiles and puts them on the board.

'Grofp'

"That is fifty four points," she says grabbing a pad of paper.

"Wait, wait wait," I say. "Grofp? Really?"

"You want to challenge?" She says with a singsong.

"What does it mean?" I ask knowing full well she is making it up. This is the fourth scrabble game we have played and of course, she has won three. The first one we played, I didn't let her win, but saw how bummed she was when she didn't. She was always coming up with words that she herself couldn't pronounce.

"It is umm…cafeteria food," she says smiling and nodding.

Grabbing the dictionary and looking at her with one eyebrow rose. I know for a fact that this isn't a word. I could easily just challenge the word and win. After all I have the perfect word there waiting.

'Zinacef'

I saw that word on a vial in the labs, some medicine that they take for infections in the lungs. Honestly I think the doctors and scientists just make up words so that they sound smart.

"Okay," I say finally putting the dictionary down. "Grofp it is."

She leans in and kisses me and then lies down on the empty portion of the blanket.

"I win," she says lifting her arms up. "What is that, four games in a row?"

"Something like that," I say. "Although I don't really keep count."

I pick up the scrabble board and put it on the grass and lie down next to her. The sunlight trickles through the trees and in the back of 37 Brooks we find that this day, it is just us, and it is as close as heaven. It doesn't even bother us that the day is hot and muggy, just spending time together we disappear into our own little world. We had seen a couple birds fly in to the big oak tree that covers most of the sun.

"This is one of my favorite things to do. You know the way the light just plays through the leaves and the causes these weird and wonderful patterns. It is the best when the wind moves it." I say. "It reminds me sometimes…of home."

"Tell me about it," she says lying on my chest. "What is it like?"

I rub her arm.

"Where to start…" I say.

"Anywhere," she says.

"Well," I say. "Once when I was ten or so, me and this kid, Flick we would go out exploring and well there was this old Gallery up in Rhode Island. Sort of like an old pier, with a boardwalk. All these stores, everything you could want, on each side, from an old ice cream place, pizzeria, and Arcade. We would pretend that we would be back in old times, before the blitz, and that people would be walking on the boardwalk clipping and clopping with their shoes on the wooden boardwalk."

"Sounds nice," she says.

"It is, sometimes I think about just crossing over and going on a hike up to see it," I say.

"How," she says. "Is it easy to umm…cross over? I mean are there a specific place where you cross over?"

"Top secret information," I say. "Someday maybe you'll see."

"I can almost picture it," she says to me.

I place my hands on her eyes. "Trust me," I tell her.

"On the corner of the Gallery, there was an old flower shop, the sign is fade and all you can tell is that it was an elaborate sign with vines looping through the empty spaces. Inside of course there were no flowers, but imagine it, a counter space where all these beautiful flowers, these blue, but not your faded blue, these bright vibrant blue, or the roses that are as deep red as you imagination can make it, and different smells that comes from them, the dinging of the bell that is over the door as someone comes in to buy flowers, for the person that he cares about. Can you see it?"

She nods her head.

"You know I have always wanted to see one, and to do like they did in the books. You know the guy give the beautiful girl a flower."

"You know once," Lena starts to say. "My little cousin Gracie once gave me a dandelion and thought it was a flower. It was the cutest thing she was I think four or so and she was so happy, well, until the wind came and blew it away. She got so sad after that."

"You never told her that it wasn't a flower," I ask.

"I couldn't," she says. "After all that she has been through, I wanted to give her…at least something nice."

She gets quiet and I know it is difficult for her say. I place my hand in hers and she grips my hand just a little bit tighter than usual. It is the hardest thing to be this vulnerable.

"It is okay," I whisper. "You don't have to tell me anything that you are not ready to share. I know…believe me I know."

She smiles, taking a deep breath and then surprisingly enough, she continues.

"Her mother died," she says looking at me. "Her heart gave out. After my uncle disappeared before his trail, she couldn't take it, so…she died. Gracie, their daughter, hasn't said a word since."

Just seeing her there, telling me all this heartache I wish I could comfort her and cousin.

"We live with our Aunt Carol, and well live there isn't as great as one would hope," Lena says. "But if she didn't take us in, then who knows where we would be. At least she kept us together. Before my sister, Rachel got cured, she lived with us and well it was a lot for our Aunt Carol to take. I always appreciated the fact that she took us in."

"So does your Aunt Carol have any children of her own?" I ask.

"She does, my cousin Jenny," she says. "She looks like this little old lady with a pinched look. She always drives me crazy, complaining all the time looking down at us, like I was the child, but of course I have to be grateful and put up with her, because her mom, my aunt took us in."

I let out a laugh at the thought of Jenny, looking like this little old woman waggling her finger at Lena, with that nasally pitched voice. I make the count, and think well there is Lena, Rachel, Grace, and Jenny, four in one room?

"So all of you guys lived in a house with only two rooms?" I ask.

"All of our beds basically touched together," she says smiling. "It looked like one huge bed, and of course when they were no one there, it looked like one too. I would hate it because sometimes in the summer time, when it would get really hot, Jenny would kick me with her legs, and of course when it was winter and it was super cold, Gracie would curl up in, by my ribs. I looked like a twisted pretzel in the morning throughout the year. But you know that is life, after all. Back when my mom was alive, we had the whole house to ourselves, and it was just me and Rachel. We would have these wonderful games, where we would pretend that we would be different places in the world, or have sock hops."

"What are sock hops?" I say.

"Well you just dance silly in your socks, and slide around on the ground," she says. "We would laugh so hard, and smile because although there wasn't music that you could dance to like that, we would make it up. Sometimes I can hear her voice, and well, it reminds me of where I am."

"I wish I could help," I say.

She gives me a small kiss on the lips.

"Just you listening helps," she says.

The day feels just like it was back on East End beach. I stand up and stick out my hand. She doesn't hesitate like she did last time, this time she laces her fingers almost as if I didn't even have to ask. Lifting her to her feet, I walk with her to through the yard and down two houses to something that I had found a couple of years ago.

"Where are we going?" She asks trying to keep up with me.

"I found something that might help," I say. "A house that I believe must have had kids, because in the backyard they have a…"

Just then she sees it and looks at me with this huge smile on her face. The house had an old swing set that still worked. I had spent a couple weekends cleaning all the rust off it. I rip off a couple of good pieces of wood from a newly condemned home to replace the seats that had rotten away. The chains were difficult to find but at the labs they use them to chain a fence around the storage area. Had to file a report with the police and say that it was probably kids.

She walks by it and places her hands on one of the swings. I stand behind her.

"Want to take it for a ride?" I say patting on the set.

"No seatbelts," she says smiling. "But Gracie would love this."

"Who wouldn't love to sit in a seat and get pushed into the sky," I say looking up. It is one of the things that we all wish for, even though we never say. It is the thought of being free.

A couple of days later, we decided to meet back at 37 Brooks. It becomes one of our favorite places to go. I can still remember the first day I brought her here. It was a Saturday and she was still trying to figure out if she was comfortable being around me. I told her that I wanted to show her what it was like to live in the Wilds, well at least the closet to it in Portland.

"How are we going to get in," Hana asks me. "It is all boarded up."

"Don't let appearances fool you," I say smiling. "There is always a way in, and out, you just have to look for it."

The approach to the house is done cautiously by Lena and Hana. For many years they were told that the Highlands were disease ridden and that if they come in contact with the homes where there were sympathizers or diseased people that they would contract it as well. It is always a fear tactic with the government, but I don't mind this one, as it keeps people away, and it allows the Highlands to be a very peaceful place.

I walk over to the third window to the left and swing a loose board that from the outside is covered by the large trees. Holding the board, Hana ventures in first, with Lena cautiously walking behind. The one thing that I love about this house is the large vaulted ceilings, and the fact that they have a beautiful garden.

"Hello!" Hana says hearing the echo. I see Lena rubbing her arms and I know that she doesn't really like the dark. I reach out and grab her hand, which she welcomes with a look at me. Pulling her close me, I sneak a kiss as Hana continues to walk through the hallways of the large house.

Lena pulls away from me, but I do not let go of her hand. I tug on it and she comes back to face me. My other hand goes around her waist; I say "want to dance?"

She pushes herself off me laughing and says. "Come on."

"I am serious," I say showing her the grandness of the room, and how back then the family probably did dinner parties here. "It's the perfect place for it."

"Umm…there is no music," she says stating the obvious.

"Music is overrated," I say pulling her into me. She fits perfectly around my arms. I start to hum, a waltz and whisper to her, "two steps to the left, two steps up, two steps to the right, and then back to the beginning."

She lets out a deep sigh and for a moment it is like the darkness of the room becomes light and I can imagine life back when this house was filled with music. I pretend that we are filled with on-lookers and people who dance around us. Then finally we stop, and she looks up at me with love in her eyes. I lean in and kiss her softly.

"What are you thinking about?" I hear a voice break me out of my day dream.

"The first day we came here," I say. "I can still hear the music."

She smiles, and then I see someone hiding behind her. A little girl grabs onto Lena's hand with both of hers. She peeks around her waist and I see that this is probably Grace, Lena's younger cousin. Lena turns around and kneels in front of Grace. She whispers something in her ear and then Grace nods yes.

"Turn your head to the left for me?" she says to me.

I do it and then can hear Lena say.

"See that," she says. "It means that he is safe."

It is that feeling, that lie that it reminds me when I told her that, when I lied to her about me being cured. She finally comes around from her and stands there looking at me.

"Think we can go see what you showed me the other day?" she says secretively. Grace looks up at her and then looks at me. I nod and I walk next to her leading her to the house with the swing set. She gets near me and grips my hand. Looking over to her I see her mouth the word 'sorry.'

I nod and then continue walking.

"Gracie come here," Lena says covering her eyes.

Once we get there, Lena removes her hand and then it is like something inside of Grace lights up. A smile goes from ear to ear and she even begins to hop excitedly. She pulls Lena by the hand, and is dragged to the swings.

"Okay, okay," Lena says laughing.

Grace sits on the seat and Lena spends the next twenty minutes pushing Gracie. I have never seen someone smile so much before. I think she even let out a small laugh, but Lena denies it. Sitting on the other swing, I just watch Lena smile and laugh and push Grace higher and higher into the sky.

The day comes and goes and it was another great day just watching Lena becoming the wonderful person that I had always known her to be. I didn't think that I could find something more beautiful about her, and then I see her with her cousin and I think she is the most beautiful person I have ever seen.

After she gets tired, she tries to stop and tell Grace that she needs a break. Grace stands up and comes to me, grabbing my hand and pointing towards where Lena is.

"I think she wants you to push her," Lena says, which Grace nods, so of course who can say no to a six year old. In intervals though I push both Lena and Grace on the swings, and both of them just smile and it was a day that I remember.

The only thing that gets Grace off the swings is the promise of cookies for dinner.

"Good thing I remembered to bring these," I say to Lena.

She leans in and kisses me on the cheek. "Thank you for today."

I shrug. "Hey everyone deserves happiness." Looking at her and I know that her whole live, both of them have suffered much heartache. Everyone deserves at least to experience happiness at least once in there lives. My desire is that she experience happiness all the days of her life.

She grabs both of my hands. "You truly believe that, don't you."

I nod and she gives Grace a couple of cookies to eat as they begin their walk back to their house. We walk on opposite sides of the street and I cannot help but walk slower than Lena just so I can see her from ahead. At the corner when she has to turn and I have to continue walking she stops and then I stop as well.

I see Gracie jumping on a puddle as happy as can be. The rain for the day before still evident on the streets, but she didn't care, all she knew today that she was happy.


	15. Chapter 15

fifteen

You know that I always loved the rain. If anything reminds me of home, it is that. Listening to the rain hit the tin roof of the trailer. It was a game we did to try to see how many times you can count the individual drops would hit. Of course this was impossible, but it always calmed me. There are a lot of things that I love about the rain other than reminding me of home. It always feel cleaner, like the rain washed away all the soot and grim of the world. The air felt cleaner in the rain, if that was possible.

"It was something that I realized when I was ten and then now when I was in Portland about the rain." I say looking out of the second floor window of 37 Brooks. "When I was a kid, I never minded getting wet and instead run and jump in the puddles. Really didn't care of the consequences of what would happen later, but yet just lived in that moment."

Turning around I see her there just looking at me, listening. The fire lights small patches of her face and it is almost like it is dancing.

"As we got older though, it seems like we forgot what it was like," I say. "And now you see people run from the rain, and hide, almost as if it touched your skin it would burn you."

She smiles.

"I think," I say and then stop. "It might be what it was like."

"Like what was like," she says.

"Life before this," I say pointing out the window. "You ever wonder what it was probably like, in those days. Sometimes it is all that I think of. You know it is like we are living running from the raindrops, like if we allowed ourselves any sort of happiness, then it would kill us."

I walk over to her and sit down next to her. It is those moments that when we could be the most truthful that we find out who we are really.

"Times like today," she starts. "I think of my mother."

I place my hand on hers and she gives me a half smile.

"You know once," she says. "I was walking and it started to rain, and it was the first time that I was able to deal with it. You know it is fairly easy to become two people. You know one that smiles and always kept together. One who goes to school, and does what there are told. The second person though, is falling apart, and of course doesn't want anyone to know, because it would make it real and that is the last thing you want, for you to come to terms that she is really gone."

"I'm sorry," I whisper.

"It is stupid I know but I made up this story that she escaped and that she wasn't really dead but living out there in the Wilds," she says with a hint of hope.

"It isn't stupid," I say. "I mean, everyone in the Wilds leave there past behind, leave there names behind, so it could be."

"Yeah…leave the past behind," she repeats.

"I am sorry," I say. "I didn't mean that. I only meant…"

"It is okay," she says. "She had the sweetest voice, and would sing to me lullabies when I was scared. Her voice always sounded like she was singing. Her last words to me were 'I love you. Remember. They cannot take it.'"

She stands and walks over to the window and see the water trickle on the glass plane. I stand up and with the blanket covering me I walk behind her and wrap her and me in the blanket. She leans back at me and I see the tears. She turns around to face me and I close the blanket around us. She places her head on my chest and I can feel her arms protecting her heart.

"Shhh," I say to her. "It is okay."

"I have to get back," she says knowing that the day has slipped from us, and we spent it just talking about everything and anything. I told her about life growing up with my Uncle Gabriel and my Aunt Beatrice. Every time we spend together is a day that I remember, in my heart I carve it in a corner so that I could never forget it.

I lean in to her kissing her shoulder and inhaling her, the way she smells.

"I wish you could stay with me," I say softly hoping both that she doesn't hear me, and also that she does.

We kiss, and then she leaves watching her walking quickly down the street, I place my hand on the window pane and wish that she would stay, but know that she can't. The rain has slowly coming to a drizzle and it feels almost as if the whole world understood us today. The rain, are like teardrops, in response to our story and our heartaches.

The walk to the apartment on Forsyth Street is a long one, and really just thinking about her today makes me realize that what I had been purposefully forgetting is coming back to memory. The memory of where we are, and who we are is enough to keep the smile from coming.

I see someone there sitting on the stoop of the building. In the rain no one really stays outside, even if it is a light drizzle. I am almost to the building when the person lifts there head and looks at me.

"Hey," I say looking behind me and then down the street, making sure that there was no one there. "What are you doing here?"

"Just stating the obvious," she says handing a paper to me. I read it and see that there is only one name on it. The government seal and the letter head, addressed to a one Hana Tate.

"Seems like you hit the jackpot," I say realizing the last name is the current Mayor of the City of Portland.

"Seems like," she says. "You know that in a couple of days, she will get her matches. I only got mines now because of who they matched me with. But you know she will have the procedure and then, everything will change…"

Standing there waiting for me to respond, nothing comes, it is like all my efforts to come to terms of it has finally come to light. Is it the same thing, I wonder? I had hoped that if I had never said it, never really admitted it, that probably it would never happen. We all knew that it was just foolish to believe that. What other choice do I have? There are none.

She snatches the paper from my hand and turns and walks away. I know that she means well, and that she is hurting. It is that very thought, those very words that keep me up at night and rob me of my sleep. Every time I close my eyes, I see her becoming like one of them. Everything that I love about her gone, taken through the needle; her light, the way she looks at me, now dead by the needle that now follows me, the thousand of needles coming to find us. Pulling her off the table and running through the streets, through the night. I am fighting against the current, fighting against the world, to keep her. It is then that I see the edge, and no where to go, no where to hide, the tears coming from her eyes.

"Just let me go," she says pulling at her hand.

"No," I say. "No, I can't. Lena, I can't do it.

She pulls and finally her hand slips from mines.

"No!" I yell out and when I come to, I find myself on the floor of my apartment, the sun beaming in. Must have fallen asleep, it must have been a nightmare. Something inside of me causes me to feel like I cannot get enough air. The walls, I look around my apartment look like they are coming in, looks like they are squeezing the air out of it.

I have to see her.

Finally getting a change of clothes, I make a run for 37 Brooks, where we had decided to go, so the beaches were now too crowded. The hot sun burns and on the ground, there is no evidence of the rain, no rain puddles to jump in, to keep the memory away. I don't think that I have ever peddled this fast before in my life, but when I do get there, she is already in the back waiting for me.

"What kept you sleeping head?" she says smiling. "Was going to go searching for you."

I quickly close the distance between us, and hold her in my arms. She at first is a little taken back but then her arms fold around my back.

"Hey," she says. "You okay?"

"Yeah," I say. "Just missed you."

She looks down at the grocery bag and then back up. It was her turn to get the food today, and well from the look on her face, I don't think that I would like what she has. She grabs the two cans and hands it to me.

'Spaghetti and Green Beans'

"Better than the cauliflower soup I had the last time," I say laughing. Her smile lights up the garden, and then she doesn't feel all that bad.

"Mix them," I say shrugging.

"You think it would taste edible?" She asks.

"Believe me, you would be glad to get that back in the…" I stop myself and remember the dream. It is a fact that she will soon be gone that has gripped my heart.

"Back in the…?" she says repeating.

"Oh," I say. "Back when I lived with my uncle and aunt."

We eat lunch and oddly enough it taste pretty good, at least from the fact the Lena is not gagging and neither or us is running to use the bathroom. We lie down on the blanket and she places her head on my chest.

"You know that Gracie painted her shoe laces with her crayon," she says rubbing my chest. "Seems like you have a fan."

"Just one?" I say jokingly.

"Well probably two, the jury is out on the second one," she responds with a smile. "She colored them purple with her crayons, and when my aunt Carol saw it, she yelled at her for ruining them…"

She yawns and there I see her eyes, tired.

"Didn't sleep?" I ask.

She nods no. "It was hard because of Grace crying. Sometimes when she thinks no one notices, but I hear her."

The sound of her voice is pained and I know that Grace didn't deserve to be yelled at. I think I may have a purple sharpie somewhere, or if not I will definitely make it my purpose to find one to give her. Running my hands through her hair, her eyes tired and I could tell that living in that house is what drains her sometimes.

"Well how about this, you take a nap here," I say patting the blanket on the ground next to me. She begins to protest and says that she wants to talk and spend time with me. "That is what you would be doing spending time with me. It is okay really, I promise it will be only a couple of minutes."

"Okay, you win," she says letting out a yawn. "See you in a little bit…"

I kiss her on her forehead.

"Meet you inside," I say.

She lets out a smile and then finally closes her eyes next to me. She had just fallen asleep and all the time I can't think of her, without imagining the needles following us everywhere. "…you know she will have the procedure and then, everything will change…" The words follow me and haunt my mind.

I stand up, picking up the empty cans and grabbing the grocery bag to put it in. Looking at the empty bag I see that it is weighed down by something. I open the bag and see a small brown matchbook of matches. I examine it, and opening it, I take out a match. The smell of the burning house, it still is evident, and it still reminds me of the anger. The pain I felt that night, the thought that everything that was me, was taken, and all that was left was a shell. It is like this. I look at her, sleeping there so carefree, and so peacefully. How could anyone want to take that away, the nervousness of her responses sometimes when she bites her lower lip, or the way she fidgets with her hands when she is looking for a way out?

Lying down, I take it out, and strike it. It flares up and there I see the passion, what people are always afraid of, the initial fire. The fire calms and begins to take its path down, consuming it as it goes. Love, is like this, people are always afraid of what happens when you are in love, how you do reckless things. It is then that when they are comfortable, that they let it consume them, removing all sorts of rational thought. Until finally, the fire travels and ends up and there is nothing left, no passion, nothing to bring comfort, and all that is left, is pain. I know that if I let it, it will burn me.

Pain can only hurt if you let it get close enough to you. Probably it is time, to start letting her go. It would be easier for both of us.

"It must be nice to be in the Wilds right now," I hear her say. Of course this totally catches me off guard. I guess she woke up on her own and she sees me "I mean – it must be cooler there. Because of all the trees and shade."

"It is," I say. She moves off my chest and looks at me, closing her eyes. It could be that she is imaging it, like I taught her.

"We could go there," I say finally knowing full well that she probably wouldn't want to.

"You're not serious," she says.

"We could go…if you want to," I say and then lying back. "We could go tomorrow. After your shift."

"But how would we…" she starts.

"Leave that to me," I respond looking at her. It could be the only hope I have. It could be just a dream, but I have to try. "Do you want to?"

She sits up, and then looking at me, I don't know if it is curiosity I see in her eyes, or just panic.

"There's no way. It's impossible. The fence – and the guards – and the _guns…_" she says and I know not curiosity but panic.

"I told you. Leave it to me," I say cupping her face, just the thought that she wants to, is enough o give me hope that it could end a different way. "Anything's possible Lena…a few hours…just to see."

She looks away and says, "I don't know."

I kiss her on the shoulder and then lie down again.

"No big deal," I say trying to seem like it isn't but truly it is. "I just thought you might be curious, that's all."

"I am curious. But…" she starts.

"Lena, it's fine, if you don't want to go. Seriously. It was just an idea," I say.

It is silent and I don't know if I imagined it but when I heard it, I thought that I was dreaming it.

"I do want to go," she says loudly.

"For real?" I say removing my arm from my face and sitting up slowly. I think about not so much what it means for me, but what it would mean for her. Looking down at the pile of matches, I realized that I was only thinking of me, of how it would feel to lose her. I'd never put myself in how much she would be risking for me.

"It means breaking curfew," I say. "It means breaking a _lot _of rules."

Those dumb matches, making me think about it, and then making me change my mind.

"Listen, Lena," I say. "Maybe it's not such a good idea. If we get caught – I mean, if _you_ got caught…"

It is a thought that I never wanted to entertain, but there it was… the possibility, the real possibility.

"I mean, if anything ever happened to you, I could never forgive myself."

She says something that just melts my resolve.

"I trust you," she says.

"Yeah, but…the penalty for crossing over…," I can't think it. "The penalty for crossing over…"

If I say it, it would make it real, and I can't think about losing her like that. I don't know if I would make it if I did.

"Hey," she says nudging me. "I know the rules. I've been living here longer than you have."

I smile, and I know what she is trying to do.

"Hardly."

She lifts up her nose and pretends that she has overalls and is grabbing them at by the straps. "Born and raised." She hawks up some spit and spits it next to her. "You're just a transplant."

I let out a laugh and try to tickle her for that last comment. She of course squirms and runs away, calling me a 'country bumpkin.' Finally she hesitates which allows me enough time to grab her by the waist and wrestle her down to the ground.

"City slicker," I say finally pinning her to the ground. She smiles and then I kiss her. She looks so beautiful there just lying there, I slowly kiss her again, and then on the side of her neck, and then finally on her bare shoulder.

"Is crossing the worst thing you have ever done?" she says.

"No," I say kissing her again.

"What's the worst thing you've ever done?" she asks me out of nowhere.

"The worst thing I've ever done…" I am saying trying to buy myself some time. The thing is that when someone knows the worst thing you have done, they can have a completely different opinion of you. I really have so much to tell her, but the fear that grips, causes me to do what I always do, either not say a thing, or lie. It is what we learn in the Wilds, to never show your cards, never show who you truly are.

Grabbing her by the waist and rolling her on top of me, tickling her, she lets out a shriek and tries to move away.

"It's what I'm thinking of doing right now." I say giving her a seductive smirk.

She moves up and that is when I see it, my favorite place on Lena. Her two little collarbones look like little wings of a bird, about to take flight. It is what I remember of her that I love so much, how she reminded me of the only thing that is free in Portland, the birds that come and go from the Wilds to the Portland. It reminds me of what she told me at East End.

'My sister used to stay on the shore and build sand castles, and we would pretend that they were real cities,…they weren't diseased at all, or destroyed, or horrible. They were beautiful and peaceful, and built of glass and light…'

She leans in and kisses me, her loose hair tickling my chest.

"I want to know all your deep, dark secrets," She says softly as she pulls me away.

"All of them? You sure?" I ask, wanting to know if she is serious about it. It isn't that I don't want to; it is that I have never shared it with anyone. If I could choose anyone, it would be her.

"Mm-hmm," she says nodding and smiling.

Who knows, probably if we are in the Wilds, I could. In here though it is like the eyes are everywhere, and the judgment to condemn me is in the shadows.

"You were in my dream last night," I say trying to tell her about one of my deep, dark secrets.

"Good dream?" she asks and I know that I can't.

"Come here," I say. "I'll show you."

My hands on her waist, I roll her to the blanket and me on top of her. She lets out a laugh and smiles. She is so beautiful, and right now, she loves me, right now she looks at me the way I always wished to. If I told her, would her look change to one at the beach, when she ran from me.

"You're cheating," she says laughing. Her hands reach up to touch my chest, and there we are the only two people in this…our sand castle, so fragile, made of glass, but perfect.

"You didn't answer my question," she says.

"I don't have to," I say kissing her. "I'm an angel."

She nods, and then smiles. She whispers in my ear.

"You're my angel…my guardian angel."


	16. Chapter 16

sixteen

Like everything in life, the things you plan for are the things that you are able to accomplish. Rushing into things always leads to mistakes and then like a house of cards, no strong foundation. That is what you are taught, that is what you learn and what you base your current understanding of life on. You learn that if you plan for it, you have the less of a chance of making a mistake, well that is for all things except one. I couldn't plan it, and even if I could how you could predict every little pit fall, every dark corner.

"Crossing over isn't impossible," I say to her inside the house. "Most things like everything with the cure is controlled by one thing… fear."

"What about the guns …those look real to me," she says.

"How large do you think is the city of Portland?" I ask.

She looks at me, trying to figure it out. With the border and fence, the city of Portland isn't actually that large. On the outside, you learn things about the places that they are going to place you. Well that was what was supposed to happen when you are going in, but my story like everything was rushed and without thought. Beatrice however was patient with me and answered everything that she had the answer for.

"The original size of the city was about 50 square miles or so," I say remember my true history class. "With the blitz and the fence and everything, the city became smaller, because they thought the easiest things to protect you have to keep small."

"I don't understand," she says.

"There aren't enough peacekeepers, or police right now," I say. "To protect the entire fence around there isn't that many people."

She looks at me and then realizes that what I already know, that the city is vulnerable. It was the same look that I gave Beatrice. Sitting in our little conversation room in the basement, it was the first time that I realized just how angry I truly was.

"What the hell are they waiting for," I say. "If there isn't enough people, enough guards, then why haven't the people who are in here taken control?"

"I don't know," she says softly.

"We follow orders from people that do not know the conditions, that do not care," I say grabbing the nearby cup of tea that she had made. "I came in, looking for my father, and I asked, how many was already here. You know what they told me?"

I say looking at the cup.

"There are more of us than you think," I say. "They wouldn't tell me how many, they wouldn't tell me where, or what the great old powerful master plan was. They told me what you are telling me now…nothing."

I smash the cup and then realize that I have been holding this, the pain only for one reason. In some warp sense, I believe that if I could hold onto the pain, then the memory of my father and mother would never disappear.

"You see, Lena," I say. "The fear is what keeps people for ever doing something. It kept me from talking to you all those months ago in Monument Park."

She grabs my hand.

"So the whole the death thing would definitely stop people from trying?" she says. "How about the electrified fence, I saw it on the news once, of a worker who died because he mistakenly touched it."

"Well, they thought of that too," I say. "Every winter what happens, I mean with the electricity?"

"You mean the blackouts?" she says.

"Yes, you could only use electricity for so long until you don't have any left," I say. "So the fence really isn't 'online' all the time and in all the location. They just say that it is to keep us in fear. It is all just smoke and mirrors, all of it."

"I still don't see how you know all this," she says. "I mean, how did you guys figure it out? Did you just keep running people at the fence, to see whether they got fried in certain places?"

It is something that I cannot tell her, I cannot tell her about Beatrice or Gabriel. Although keeping things from her, is something that I don't want to do, I have to protect them, and her from anyone being able to find out that they are sympathizers.

"Trade secrets," I say with a smile. "But I can tell you there were some observational experiments involving wild animals…ever eaten fried beaver…fried skunk?"

"Now you're just _trying _to gross me out," she says showing a gagging effect.

"Sorry," I say.

"So even if you know where the fence isn't on," she says looking down. "How could you know that the guards if we are to find any, are on the ..."

"The side of the Invalids?" I say. "You know there are more of us than you think. We even have some regulators, police, scientists, and even government officials."

This of course is the same line of bull that Beatrice fed me, and of course was the same thing that was fed to her. Who really knows the exact amount of people? That is something that we have yet to know.

"That is how we are going to cross," I say. "The wife of a regulator, who works the night shift at the fence over at Turkey's Bridge, is the way we are getting over."

"But how?" she says. "And don't tell me 'trade secrets.' Please, just tell me."

It is dangerous if she knew, because it puts a lot of people in danger. Looking at her, I know that although she might not understand this, it is an acceptable risk.

"There is a sign that we use in order to let the wife of the regulator that someone wants to cross," I start to say. "Whenever that flyer for an eye exam is placed in their mailbox, she makes a 'special coffee' or an extra dose of Valium coffee for her husband. Poor guy. No matter how much coffee he drinks, he just can't seem to stay awake."

"So we just walk on out," she asks.

"No actually we have to climb over the fence, quietly" I say. "It is important that you take your time at the top. The razor wire is no laughing matter and if you panic, you can really do yourself some damage. The guard will be knocked out, so there is no need to panic."

"Well if you keep saying panic, and razor wire," she starts to say.

"Hey," I say walking over to her and then embrace her. "Don't worry; you will have your guardian angel here watching over you tomorrow. I will guide you through, just do what I do and you will be fine."

I look out the window and see that the sun is almost down. It means that our day is almost over, but tomorrow, she will see what everyone in this city hasn't. The beauty of what is outside the fence is just within reach, it is like being outside a candy store.

"Yes I will be fine as long as if I get cut by the razor wire, I do it 'quietly'?" she says cracking a worry smile.

"Well, you don't want to attract attention, even if the guard is passed out," I say.

"Okay, so I do this," I grab her hand and pump her hand three times. "Means move, okay? The more we plan the better we will be. I have done this dozen of times and without any issues. I know that the first time is scary; it was for me when I first crossed over. My heart was beating like crazy, and I thought they would hear it."

I kiss the top of her head, and try to reassure her that it would be okay.

"Okay," she says. "Where?"

"Midnight, you remember that place where we met up at Back Cove?" I ask.

She nods.

"Okay that is where I will be waiting for you." I say.

The whole next day I spend preparing, packing supplies, going over the mental list. It is like I am on automatic mode, and every conversation, every interaction, I do it without thinking. The whole day at work, all I can think about is tonight. The first time I crossed back, it was right after the barn fire, after I saw it go up and be consumed totally by the fire.

"Are you okay?" Beatrice says to me after hearing of the fire that happened in Roaring Brook Farms. I had been staring at the floor of my room for a while and couldn't hear her until she was close enough. The only thing I can see, is the fire, and how hot it burned. I couldn't move, I couldn't hide, it was like my body was frozen there watching the whole thing being consumed.

"Alex," she shouts.

It jolts me back.

"What?" I say looking around helplessly trying to remember where I was.

"Was it you?" she asks. "Did you burned down the farm that they are saying in the news?"

I look into her eyes and know that I cannot lie. Not to her.

"They took something of mine, so I took something of theirs," I say. "Law of the Wilds, hurt or be hurt, eye for an eye."

"That isn't the way, it isn't what the cause is trying to achieve. Did you even think about what if there was someone inside?" she says. "What would be your answer then?"

Silent, that is all I can do. There are no words to return, no smart response, and no joke to say. There was only one life that I have ever taken, and it was so long ago, that his eyes haunt me.

"You don't understand," I say. "You don't know what it is like. You have lived here all your life."

"You feel like you cannot breathe. Like the walls are closing in, that you are losing a piece of you everyday, and that you are forgetting what it is like on the other side?" she says. "Tell me if that sounds familiar."

How could she know, only if she had crossed.

"How could you know, only if you have been there," I say.

She looks away. "It is when you know," she says. "When you cannot remember the feeling of being free, or even what it is like to feel pain that is when you know that you are lost. I went back then, and now cannot remember the feeling. But Alex, if you truly feel that way, there is a way to cross, not safely, but it is possible."

It was the first time I crossed and it was the first time that I realized that time had passed when you leave and people change. Crest Village Mobile Park was no longer my home, people had changed and people had died. It becomes a way of life. A couple of weeks after I had left, Christine left and never came back, no one really know where she went or if she is even alive. It is a fortunate thing that she had left, because a storm came and crushed the roof of the trailer that I shared with Christine. Who knows what we would find when we cross again, tonight.

I walk down the block of Congress Avenue until I see the house with the bright blue trimmed windows. It is the only way the resistance remembers anything. They aren't too keen on remembering addresses so it is mostly on landmarks and anything that makes absolutely no sense to anyone else but the resistance. You see, there are stories, of people who have been captured. No one really knows if they are true, or if they are just meant to keep us in line, but stories of torture to obtain information. Information is important and is worth more than the person, for both sides. This is dangerous, crossing and places everyone that I know in danger of being caught. The beautiful tree is the only thing that I remember. The yellow flowers that bloom in the summer time is the beacon that I remember.

The sidewalks are empty and the houses blinds are closed. If anyone has caught on, they would be watching and could be watching. I bend down to tie my shoe that I had left purposefully untied. It gives me the opportunity to stop and look at the houses next to it. I put in a bunch of flyers in each of the mailboxes that line up the houses. It only means something to the one with the blue trimmed windows.

The nearby bus stop takes me to Back Cove and looking down at my watch, curfew is within a couple of hours and there are many different hiding places in Back Cove. The bus comes and then watching Portland through the glass, it almost feels like a distant memory that will soon be forgotten. The park at Back Cove is almost empty and all I have to do is wait until curfew to hide in the shadows. Hours pass and there in the trees I see only shadows of the trees that move slightly with the wind. The minutes move quickly every time I see my watch and come to see that it is almost midnight. This is something that you learn in the Wilds, on how to wait and be still. Patience is drilled into you, because all you know is that 'someday' things will be better. A small rustle of the leaves and I slowly move back seeing her trying to be quiet as she moves. I reach up and grab her hand pulling her down in a crouch position.

I kiss her softly and then point towards the lights on the border. She looks back and nods. Pumping her hand three times she nods and we move alongside the darkness of the trees, making every effort to walk on grass and no leaves. We are down through the restricted road, darting from shadow to shadow, looking behind making sure that she is still there. She follows me closely and without any sound.

There is one exposed spot that if not timed properly you can be visible. At the end of the trees comes to a clearing and then a small patch of tall trees. Crouching for a couple seconds I look at the spot light and when it moves away, I run for the tree. Look back and she finally catches up with me and crotches next to me. I see her hands and can tell that they are trembling. I lean over to her, and whisper, "it's going to be okay."

She only looks at me, before I turn around and then we make a dash for the fence. It is the most exposed and the most dangerous, but it is the point of no return. Even if we are caught here and now, we still have a shot of making it up and over as long as we move and move quickly. The fence sways as I climb it. Looking down I see that Lena is standing at the base just looking at me. I nod at her, jerking my hand to hurry up. It takes her a couple times but finally she gets her hand on the fence and starts to climb. At the top, I look for the spot to put my feet, and when I do, I move in between the loops and then my hands into the loops. Once I am on the other side I climb down a couple of feet before stopping and looking at her place her hands and feet in the same place that I had.

She is over, and I can finally breath, I can finally look into the city and find that nothing is moving, and no one is coming. My feet touch the ground and as I wait scan the park and can see the distant twinkling lights. Her feet touch the ground and I grab her hand pulling her quickly into the woods towards the two trees that we had marked. It looks like two arms connecting creating a pathway.

Ten seconds pass the trees and then the flashlight in the half buried toolbox. I push through the tree limbs with her hand secured in mines. The first couple of second we run in a straight path and I count, one…two….three…four…five…six….seven…and feel Lena's hand tug at me.

"A little farther," I say. I continue to count three more seconds and can hear her call my name. The familiar tree comes into view and I see the blue marker.

"Stop," I say. "Wait."

Where the heck is that damn flashlight? I move my feet from side to side trying to hit the box I buried. It I let go of her hand and can hear her breathing begin to increase and a small shriek. I turn around and fumble trying to find her again. Her hands, working my way along her face, her eyes, and then finally her nose. I lean in and kiss it on the tip.

"It's okay," I say. "I'm not going anywhere. I just have to find this damn flashlight, okay?"

Her hands meet mines and then finally I hear her say. "Yeah, okay."

I lean forward and kiss her on the corner of her lips. I could only imagine what she must be going through. It is the same thoughts and the same fear that I must have had when I first crossed into Portland. The fear of being shot, there that day, having to hide under the truck, it is still fresh in my mind. "You're doing great."

The coldness of her hands I warm with my breath. The fear must have drained the blood from her hands. Especially for that split second when I let her go. The darkness in the woods, the uncertainty of everything around her, it is a scary thought. I kiss her hands and the finally I let her go.

Looking around, I try to find with my feet the toolbox. The last time I crossed it was buried right near the tree, and now it is gone and all I feel is air and leaves. "Where the hell is it," I mutter. "Damn people always moving it, and never leaving it in the same spot."

I move to my hands and knees and then finally find it with my hands. Flipping it open I grab the cylinder and then push the button.

"Found it," I say point the light towards her. She puts up her hand to shield her eyes from the light. It is at that second that I see her, and my heart finally can beat regularly. We are here, we are free, and we are safe. I reach out for her hand and she looks at me with those warm soft eyes, and reaches out and grabs my hand. The warmth of her hand and I know that all of this was worth it. I point the flashlight to the metal toolbox and tell her that it is one of the places we leave for people who cross. It is the safest time to cross and of course very difficult to navigate in the Wilds without a flashlight. The crickets, the hooting, and even the rustles of the wind is nothing compared to what else looms out here.

Walking with her, I move branches and clear paths for her. Lighting the way, I flick up to the left and right, checking for the markers. It is there that I see the blue paint and follow it. Her hand tight around mines and I am pretty sure she is curious on how I even know where I am going.

"That paint…" I hear her say, and realized that she has caught on to where I was pointing.

"Our road map," I respond, "you don't want to get lost in here, trust me."

It is then that I feel the rough terrain suddenly smooth out with the bomb out roads. I shine the light down on the road, and she sees it, lifting up to meet the change in elevation. The bombed out places where the craters are left. Without the flashlight you wouldn't be able to see it, and even if I separate from her a little bit, she might not see one.

"Give me your hand," I say whispering as I point the flashlight beam to the dark shadows. There are different kinds of people in the Wilds just like there are different people in Portland. Most of them live in communities and keep society together. There are though, those that we call Scavengers that are thieves and hide in the dark corners waiting for people who are crossing. Supplies, especially medical supplies, people have killed for; I have heard many horror stories, where band aids were the prize. The most ridiculous thing, band aids. It is why that while inside; it took me a while to come to terms with people who would waste things that still had use. Every time I would stock up medical supplies just to have, just in case.

"What is this?" Lena whispers.

"This_ was_ a street," I say. "Destroyed during the blitz. There are thousand and thousands of them, all across the country. Bombed out, totally destroyed."

As long as we stick to the road we should be fine. I can feel the hilt of the knife that I placed underneath my shirt when I picked up the flashlight. It is important that we have a flashlight, but it is life and death if there was no way to defend yourself. It is the one thing that I never mentioned to Lena. If she had known of the dangers of the Wilds, that animals as well as people can kill, she would have never gone with me. This of course wasn't in the pamphlet of the Wilds, they don't tell you of the cold harsh winters and the constant need of eating, because there isn't that much food out there to being with. They never told me this, for I was born here, and that idea was just the way of life.

"Odd thing to see," she says.

I look back and see her pointing at the little white house in the middle of the field. When I was younger, I wandered far away from the community and found myself in the middle of this same field. It was where I first met Old man Hicks. I can still remember it like it happened a couple of hours ago.

It was raining and I couldn't find my way back, I couldn't find the markers. The darkness had eaten the daylight and without a flashlight, I knew that I wouldn't make it. If the animals in the Wilds didn't get me, the Scavengers surely would. It wasn't until I saw the house that I decided that if I could just get out of the rain until it passed, then I could find my way back home again. The little white house, inviting and of course to a boy that was just ten looked like it was a gift. Inside though it was a different situation, looks of course are deceiving.

There inside the house was filled with furniture, supplies, everything, and of course it felt like it was a dream. A house right out of time before the blitz, with everything the way it was before the bombs came. It was the screams that kept me frozen inside. The screams of a man coming from a room at the end of the hall, screams that still haunt me, yelling for help. Something though compelled me to walk, like my body was moving but my mind gripped with fear was trying to stop. The old wooden floor creaks and moan as I made it to the half opened door, I see a man lying on the bed with a gun in his hands.

Once I saw him there, I couldn't leave him.

"Boy," he says. "Help me."

He lowers the gun and then places it on the ground. He can probably see the fear in my eyes and wants to make sure that I feel comfortable enough to come inside the room, which smelled as bad as if someone had died, the stench of urine filled the room and caused me to almost gag. Taking one step, I stop and cannot come in further. Inside the room I see canned food next to the old man, some of them opened and some still closed.

"What…what, do you need?" I say.

"Peace," he says breathing hard. "Peace that has eluded me for so long. Please, help me find it."

He points to the gun that is on the ground. It is the first time that I realized what he wanted me to do. I have never ever even thought of killing anyone. Taking the life of another is like taking the freedom of their fight.

"I can't," I say starting to turn and leave.

"Please," he cries. "When the horse ain't no good, you're doing the horse a favor. Put me down, for the love of God, put me down."

"I can't," repeat.

"My body is broken, can't walk without it hurting all over, I can't…please," he says crying. "I can't do it myself."

He points at the bullets on the nearby table. Shaking my head, I close the door and start to run down the hall, where I hear him cry louder and louder for help. Stopping right at the entry, I look back and realize that he will suffer everyday, and has for a long time. The rain traps me there, and I think that it would be better to run into the Wilds and take my chances, but I couldn't do it.

What do I do, I say to myself as I pace. The screaming and the crying was too much, and my hands couldn't block out the noise the pain. It was the only thing that I could do, the only shameful thing that I did, that shapes everything and tore away the last bit of innocence that I believed I had.

It was the only time that I had killed anyone.

I stare at it now, the perfect little white house that looks like it has been left there forgotten. She looks at me and wonders probably why I am staring at the house, why we have stopped in the dark here with the flashlight. I grip the light as if I could have only had one, that day, I wouldn't have to have gone inside.

"Does anyone stay there now?" Lena asks me.

I couldn't tell her, and wouldn't know how to start. If telling her that I was an Invalid scared her, what would she think of, if she knew? If she really knew what I did?

"Sometimes people squat, when it's rainy or freezing. Only the roamers, though – the… Invalids …who always move around." I say. "We pretty much stay away from here. People say the bombers might come back and finish off the job. But mostly it's just superstition. People think the house is bad luck."

I look at her and smile the fakest smile I could.

"It's been totally cleaned out, though. Beds, blankets, clothes – everything. I got my dishes there."

"This way," I say holding back the tears of an Old man that changed my life. We walk through the darkness of the night and back into the woods, back into the safety of the Wilds. The last thing that I want to do is take the innocence that Lena still has.


	17. Chapter 17

seventeen

I know it is silly, and more than likely impossible, but some days when it is really quiet in the Wilds, I can almost hear her. In those days when I felt the most alone, it was like she was there with me. The feeling that she was with me, always gave me comfort, it calmed me when I couldn't be else calmed. When I was crying it was those words that I always felt dried those tears. It is when I miss her the most that I feel her the closest. It was almost as if she never truly died but I know then that it was just me trying to hold onto a person I probably never met. I was only three, when she died, but her voice still as if a long locked memory, soft and always calm every night before I would sleep.

"There was once a miracle that was birth out of love. The truest expression, it was like the sunrise birthed everyday, beautiful and unique, my little prince."

The sunrises mean something more to me that just another day, it is the way she saw me. It was the reason behind all those books, to know that in love I would always my reason why I was here. She promised my mother to always surround me in love, when everyone knew that my mother wouldn't get to see me grow up.

'_Right before the sun rises there's a moment when the whole sky goes this pale nothing color – not really gray but sort of, or sort of white, and I've always liked it because it reminds me of waiting for something good to happen.'_

Her hand in mine, trusting me as we go into the Wilds, is like she sent me someone that I could finally trust. I brush aside a branch and see the markers. Looking back I see her the darkness take away the details of her face, but her hand in mine is all I need to know that she is the one. It is as if this connection was designed to fit together, to be one with hers.

The path, worn and deliberate with the branches pulled away and broken. I can't really put my hand on it, but I think we are close. I slow down the pace and then tune my ears to hear the sounds of the Wilds. It is there that I see it, the coke can pinwheels that turns when windy, reflected when shined upon, and catches when rained upon. It is what we help make when we were kids. I quickly stop and turn to face her. She crashes right into my chest, and there I close my eyes and breath her in. Her hands reach up to my chest, and my hands wrap around her waist. Her ear so close to my mouth that only a whisper would appropriate, I could stay like this holding her for hours. I can feel her smile if that is at all possible. I click the flashlight off, and trace my lips along her cheek, reaching her ear.

"Close your eyes," I say.

"Why bother? I can't see anything," she says, which causes me to smile and almost laugh.

"Come on, Lena," I plead.

"Fine," she says and I see her expression. The moonlight peek through the clouds and then through the trees, it touches lightly her face and it looks almost as if it a picture perfect sight. I put the flashlight in my bag, whipping my hand on my pants; I grab her hands with mines. I look back and see the rows of trailers the fires have all been put out. I guess there isn't anyone waiting like they use to do.

"Step up. There's a rock," I say to her maneuvering her around the obstacles that a blind person would have difficulty seeing on the ground. "A little bit to the left."

I finally stop at the middle of the community where there is still some light from the fire. It is the place where we would have our meetings, and have our meals as a group. It was the one thing about our community, one of the few rules that we had here, everyone eats together, and everyone shares their food. It looks a little different since the last time I was here, almost as if people have left.

"We're here," I say. "Open up."

She does and then the smoldering fire from the surrounding trailers, illuminate everything at least part of the time, almost as if it is a puzzle and you have to guess as the parts that aren't lit. She stands there for a moment, and with her hands clasp she lift them to her chest as she slowly turns. I can see the excitement in her eyes, and know that although it took a couple of dangerous moments we were here.

"Well?" I say getting next to her. "What do you think?"

It is like she can't talk, and I look towards where she is looking, and it is the same look that she gave me all those days ago in East End Beach. Does she believe that this is that world that her sister and she believed as kid? That it could be more than sand castles, that it could very well be the city, the life where the cure doesn't exist and neither does the disease.

"It's…it's _real,"_ she says. I couldn't help but smile. It wasn't a sandcastle in her mind anymore. It was something that she could touch and believe in. It was a place that had no fences, had no rules, only the ones that you live by. It was a place where you were free to love, and free to choose. I wonder though, is this world somewhere that she could see herself living in?

"Of course it's real," I say.

She turns to face me, and I can't help but to brush the hair out of her eyes. The only thing that doesn't feel real is this moment. Am I dreaming? Is she truly here? He face feels real, but something is different as my hand skate around her features. The tips of my fingers burn like a match striking, almost as if I am catching fire, it is a new sensation a new experience. It is there that I realize, that the difference between then and now, is that looking around there is no one to tell us that it is wrong, no one to tell us to stop.

She must notice this because she turns away and looks around at the beat up old trailers from a time that was long forgotten.

"I mean, it's amazing," she says walking towards one of the trailers. I walk next to her and wish that I could experience what she is. The first time I crossed back into the Wilds, it was as if I was taking a breath of air for the first time. Like before I was under water and everyone was walking slowly. The colors look bland and even the words sound muffled. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn't breathe there, well it was until I met her. She walks a little bit quicker, although I am sure she doesn't know the way to my home. I pick up the pace and start to tell her about people that lived here. I am not really sure if they still do, but I want her to know my home as I do.

"See?" I say pointing at the trailers. "The blitz didn't get everything."

"You didn't tell me," she walks around the circle of logs that is where we eat every night. It is how we keep count of who made it back from the day. People usually don't talk as much during that time, but someone always count. It is how we know if someone is sick and cannot make it, it is how we know if someone dies and we all grieve. Sometimes, it is rare, but sometimes someone would sing a song that was from the old days and it would bring a smile to some and others would cause a tear. Eloise could sing so beautifully that one day, people just started to dance. Christine showed me once, to dance, must have been thirteen I think. We had just survived another harsh winter and everyone was celebrating that no one died that year, we all survived. Funny how living would create a celebration, the things that you take for granted. It was like a birthday for everyone when spring finally came, it meant one more year that we would be here. It was better than your birthday, it was better than clean river stream to take a shower in, the year that no one died; it was as if everything was right. Pots and pans became our instruments and there at night, we didn't care about the Scavengers, or the animals, we only cared about the happiness we felt that night. The smallest thing like living free that caused you to celebrate.

"You didn't tell me it was like this," she says with a smile.

I see the ribbed cans and sticks that were next to it. It seems like tonight was a party night, and people were laughing and singing.

"It's the kind of thing you need to see for yourself," I say kicking some dirt on the dying fire. "Looks like we came too late for the party tonight."

I extend my open hand and, smile. "Come on let me give you the penny cent tour."

She digs into her pants and then takes out the insides of her pocket. She shrugs and looks at me.

"Sorry no pennies here," she says.

"Okay well, it will be an I.O.U. then," I say grabbing her hand showing her around. I tell her about who lives where, and the stories of the time a squirrel got trapped in the camp. Everyone chased that darn thing, and even when it tried to climb the trees, the kids back then climbed right behind it. I pull up my shirt and show her the scars I got from climbing the tree back then trying to catch it, only to fall and get the wind knocked out of me.

The small gray trailer comes into view. It is in a snug area of the community close to the others. I can still see the multicolored quilt that Christine made still in the window. It was one of the things she told me about my life.

'You see this,' she shows me strains of fabric purple, yellow, red, and green. I nod and she tells me that, 'this is how life is here in the Wilds. Our experiences, our moments, our memories, tie in our lives. It is like a scar on your arm, reminding you of where you got it. It ties us together, the good and the bad.'

I stop at the foot of the trailer. I turn and look at her, with a smile. She returns it with a soft look of happiness.

"And um, this is me," I say. I remind myself of the last time I was here, and couldn't for the life of me believe that I would ever come back with her here. I didn't even know her, but I wanted to. It was the day right after I saw her in Monument Square. It was the day that they told me that Christine had left. It was the day that the roof was ripped from it. I cleaned it as best I could and hung all the books that were wet on makeshift clotheslines. Some were too far gone to even try to save, putting them in a pile in a corner that was there for burning. Good thing they were about life now, the cure, and everything about the current government. My favorite books, the poetry books, the love stories, the fairy tales, where inside a metal refrigerator that was inside the trailer. The history books of the past and the philosophy books were all in the stove.

"Wow. It's – it's -" she starts to say.

"It's not much, from the outside," I say. I feel my heart begin to beat faster and faster. It is the one thing that I had always wanted when I met her. To show her where my true home was and how 37 Brooks' garden reminded me of my home. "Do you want to, um, come in?"

She nods and I can feel everything get light, the brightness of everything. The crickets quiet down and all I can do is look up at the stars. It was as if I couldn't want anything more than this moment. Another piece of fabric tied with everything else. It could be that it really isn't just a new fabric, but that she is the yarn that attaches everything to it. The purpose I guess is to love someone, it is what ties everything, and gives everything a meaning, a reason for it all, and this, her, standing here in front of my trailer with her hand in mine, is my string that ties everything. She ties the good and the bad together and makes it so that it feels okay, that the experience of it was necessary to get me to her.

My hand travels up to meet the underside of her chin. I lift it gently for her eyes to meet mine. The piercing deep eyes that glow in the moonlight, it travels deep inside and the walls that I had always up, crumbs like glass. She is the only one, that can do this, and it leaves me with this feeling, that I am not alone. I lean in and kiss her. It is like the whole world in that moment stops and comes alive inside. Like a star going supernova inside and only her lips is what can contain me from coming apart. Every where in my body burns with anticipation, burns with a passion that I wish I could share with her. It is like I am on fire, and I don't wish to be put out.

Pulling away from her is like being ripped away from me. I can see her breathing has increased and so have mines. It wasn't from any feeling of nervousness, but from the need to breath, the need to feel alive.

"Come on," I say opening the door. She walks in and when I close the door, I can feel her apprehension grow from the lack of lights.

"There's no electricity out here," I say walking towards the other side of the wall. It would have been smart to remember where I had left the candles. I move slowly and pump into the end table. "Crap." I let out and then move into a pile of books that I had left in the middle of the pathway.

"Do you have candles?" she asks.

Where the hell is it, I think to myself. The rope that I had attached to the edge of the tarp is always hard to find when there are no lights or candles. I grab the chair from the 'kitchen' and start to feel around for it.

"Even better," I say grabbing the broom and starting to poke the roof. It seems that there was a small puddle of water there, because as I poked, I hear Lena let out a shriek, and then the water splash on the ground. "Sorry, sorry. I haven't been here in a while. Watch out."

Success I say to myself as I find the rope and begin to tug at it slowly. The tarp begins to roll away, exposing the view of the night sky. It is the best thing I believe that happened when that branch came crashing down. The roof had to be removed and the branch that fell was the only thing that obstructed the view. I did have to go up in the higher branches and cut them down in order to get the perfect view.

She lets out a gasp and I see her there looking up at what caught my attention the first time I saw it. The thousand upon thousands of stars that light up the sky. The brightness of the moonlight that brings a dull light to the inside, it is like the night has turned on the lights.

"It's beautiful." I hear her say.

I turn and look at her smiling. The funniest things are the fact that she believe that beautiful things are not what people in Portland say is beautiful. That was one of my favorite things she said, back when we were inside. It was that one time, when we were there kissing on the ground of 37 Brooks. The memory of the wet grass that filled the air was the first thing that I noticed there lying on the ground. The hot humidity was the second thing, and the fact that all the kissing was causing both of us to sweat profusely. It was one of those days, that we spent just kissing and exploring her body with the tip of my hands. The fact that if I traced her collarbones it would remind me of wings of a small bird, it always made me smile, because she was my little bird that would take me from feeling trapped to feeling free again.

Her hands would move under my shirt and along my stomach.

"Sorry," I say pulling away from her. "The humidity, you know…sweating not the most attractive thing."

She smiles and lifts the other hand to my cheek. I reach down and tug at my shirt, taking it off, wiping down the sweat with my shirt. "There, much better." Looking back at her there, her face blushes with redness. Her hand begins to reach up to touch my skin, but stops midway.

"It's okay," I say. "I am not ticklish. Well at least not there."

She reaches out and finally touches my chest. Her hand is warm to the touch and welcomed on my skin. She traces her hand to the middle and there stops feeling for my heart.

"It is so steady," she says. "How do you do it?"

I place my hand on her heart on top of her shirt.

"It is the opposite for me," I say. "As soon as you are not here, my heart races, like it is going to come out of my chest. When you are here with me, it is the only time that I am calm enough."

I lean into her, and stop within inches of her lips.

"Close your eyes," I say. "Do you trust me?"

She nods. Her eyes closes and I lean in and kiss her closed eyes one by one. Her hands reach around my back and then down around my waist. I sweep my hand around her head and slowly lift her up.

She whispers. "Sorry."

"What for," I say.

"The humidity, you know…sweating not the most attractive thing," she repeats as she smiles with her eyes still closed.

"Can I?" I say my hands on the bottom of her shirt. She nods. And I slowly pull her shirt over her head. Her hands come over her stomach and then finally her eyes open looking at me. I lean in trying to kiss her but she lowers herself back on the ground. It is like she is scared of what I think. Her eyes aching for a response, as her hands come and stop on my waist. Looking at her, and all I can think of, the only word that comes to my mind, is the same one that comes when I hear a baby laugh and when the sun would rise. It is what the poets, and the author described in books, and I think it might have been the sensation of the first person who tried to define it.

"Beautiful."

It is then that I lean in and kissed her heart. Her eyes looked at me like she wished this moment would last forever. It was the first time that my heart and hers beat at the same time. It was what I thought. Those eyes though it is what pierced into my soul. It is those eyes that I see right now, covered in the silver light standing in the center of my trailer. Her smile can calm the storm and can make me feel so wonderful.

"One day a storm took out half the roof. I wasn't here, fortunately. I decided I might as well get rid of the whole thing."

I roll out the last part and then hop down the chair. "It's my own convertible house."

"It's incredible," she says looking at me so intently.

I walk by her and touch her hand. "Now I'll get the candles." The kitchen is where we kept them last, and it was where I put them, in one of those drawers. I grab a bunch of them and start to light each one around the trailer. I look at her in wonder, as she starts to walk towards the bookshelves. I hand her a candle and continue lighting them as she looks at the books.

"What are these?" I hear her say. Looking back at her, I see that she is on the first bookshelf, second row.

"That's poetry," I say.

"What's poetry," she asks. I light the last candle and walk back to her. She stands there looking at the many books, and then when I join her, she looks at me. I scan the books looking for my favorite and then when I find it. I hand it to her.

She opens it and begins to leaf though the pages, taking care of the pages, as if there were made of glass.

"Shakespeare? The guy who wrote _Romeo and Juliet?_ The cautionary tale?" she says looking up.

"It's not a cautionary tale," I say. "It's a great love story. They banned poetry years ago, right after they discovered a cure."

I grab the book and opening it, I ask. "Would you like to hear a poem?"

She nods and I turn the pages until I find Shakespeare's Sonnet 18. Clearing my throat, I start to stretch my shoulder, then my head and finally again clearing my throat.

She lets out a laugh and nudges me on the arm.

"Go on. You're stalling."

I clear my throat one more time and start with a soft word. Trying to imagine that this poem although written so long ago, and yet tonight it was written for her.

"Shall I compare thee to a summer's day? Thou art more lovely and more temperate…" I start to say looking up to see her eyes is closed. "…rough winds do shake the darling buds of May, and summer's lease hath all too short a date. Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines, and often is _her_ gold complexion dimmed; and every fair from fair sometime declines, by chance or nature's changing course untrimmed. But thy eternal summer shall not fade, nor lose possession of that fair thou are; nor shall Death brag thou wander in _her_ shade, when in eternal lines to time thou grow: So long as _I can_ breathe or _my _eyes can see, so long lives this, and this gives life to thee."

She opens her eyes and looks at me. It is the first time that my heart was in those words. It was the first time that I understood what Shakespeare meant. The level of passion, to compare the beauty of a person to the creation of the world, it has left this place as quiet as I have ever felt.

"What?" she says.

Flipping the pages I find my favorite, Sonnet 43. When I first saw her, the first thought that came to mind was how free she was. When I saw there running and laughing, it was when I knew. "You want to hear a different one?" It was the beginning of these words.

"How do I love thee? Let me count the ways. I love thee to the depth and breadth and height my soul can reach, when feeling out of sight. For the ends of being and ideal grace…"

I walk over to her and kiss her forehead very gently. "I love thee to the level of every day's most quiet need…" I kiss each of her cheekbones, lightly every so softly. "…by sun and candle-light. I love thee freely…"

"Alex," she says and I stop.

"Elizabeth Barrett Browning," I say as my finger traces over her nose. "You don't like it?"

"No. I mean, yes. I mean, I do, but…" she trails off unsure of what to say. It is as if I know what she wants to say but can't.

"You don't have to explain," I say a little bit saddened by it. I wonder if she loves me the same way that I do. I wish she would just let herself go. Taking a step back, I close the book and place it on the top of the bookshelf.

"Come here," I say extending my hand. "I want to show you something."

She gives me her hand and I lead her over to my bed. I sit down and can feel her hand yank back every so lightly.

"It's okay, Lena," I say lying down to one side, patting on the side next to me. When she finally does, I tilt my chin up towards the night sky. "See?"

She looks up and there it is, the reason why this is the perfect place to be. The thousand stars just light up the entire sky. It is so beautiful like little hanging windows looking down at us.

"What do you think?" I ask.

"I love it," she says quickly. A smile creeps up on me and I realize that she just said it without really thinking about it. It was like the way love is express, without fear.

"I love it," she says again and all I can do is smile.

"The no-plumbing thing is kind of a bummer," I say. "But you have to admit the view is killer."

"I wish we could stay here," she says and then quickly adds… "I mean, not really. Not for good, but…_You_ know what I mean."

I do know what she means. It is the heart speaking what the mind cannot say. We are all trapped by our fears and I wish that she would realize that she is safe with me, that whatever she truly feels she could share.

"Alex?'

"Yeah?" I respond.

"Tell me that poem again." She says lowly, and as I look over to her I see her eyes have closed and her words have become calm.

"Which one?" I whisper wishing not to wake her.

"The one you know by heart," she responds.

"I know a lot of them by heart." I say.

"Any one, then," she says. I close my eyes and hear her voice, her softness and her beauty. The song in her voice as she says to me.

"I carry your heart with me…" I say and grabbing her hand I place it on my chest. "…I carry it in my heart. I am never without it. Anywhere I go you go, my dear; and what is done by only me is your doing, my darling. I fear no fate. For you are my fate, my sweet. I want no world. For beautiful you are my world, my true. And it's you are whatever moon has always meant and whatever a sun will always sing is you."

I look over to her and she is fast asleep. It is that moment that I smile and know the end of the poem is what Christine told me my mother would say to me.

"Here is the deepest secret nobody knows. Here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud and the sky of the sky of a tree called life; which grows higher than soul can hope or mind can hide. This is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart…" I whisper next to her ear.

"I carry your heart," I finish hearing her voice, my mother voice as she came near and kiss me on my forehead. I do the same and coming near I kiss her on her forehead. "I carry it in my heart."

I feel it, blurring my vision and finally coming down my cheek and then to my chin. My hand comes to my chin and I catch it there before it fell on her face. I gently move down off my bed and then looking at her I grab a blanket and cover her with her.

I walk to the door grabbing my backpack. Opening the door I look back and see that she is still sound asleep. Once I am outside I walk through the stillness of the dark to the trailer across the road and to the left. It is a little late, but if I am lucky, he might still be up. I knock on the window and wait for it.

Nothing.

Then I knock again and finally the curtain moves.

"What?" he says with his eyes closed.

"Got something, you awake," I say.

"That you, Alex?" he says.

"Who else would wake you up this late?" I say with a smile.

"Shit, what the hell are you doing here?" he says. "Wait let me get dressed."

I walk over to the door and wait there. In about a couple of minutes the door opens and there he is one of my closet friends. He walks down and we embrace. We talk for about an hour or so about life inside and how it feels like I am dying there. He tells me about the community and how things haven't been the same since I left. He tells me that he heard from some nomads that Christine had made it to New York. That little bit of information we can never confirm but it does bring a false sense of happiness that she maybe safe.

"Colin," I say opening the bag. "Got medical supplies, some clothes, and some food, make sure the community gets it?"

"Yeah man, of course," he says grabbing the supplies.

"Got to go back across in a couple, but wanted to make sure that I got you the supplies," I say slipping on the empty backpack.

"Little late man," he says looking around. "You got protection?"

"I checked," I say lifting up my shirt and showing the hilt of the knife. "No trace of them around."

"Be safe," he says embracing me again.

"You too," I say walking back to the trailer. It is the only thing I could do to try and help. It will go a long way for everyone here. All the cans I could buy, and all the medical supplies I can get from the labs. It should keep them good through the summer and fall.

Inside she still is fast asleep, and although I wish I didn't have to wake her up, an hour has passed and I don't want the guard waking up. I slide back next to her and there facing her, so peaceful and yet filled with so much love.

I gently shake her awake and she looks at me, as I move her hair from her face. Her eyes trained on mines.

"Time to go," I say.

"What time is it?" she says still groggy.

"A little before three," I say standing back up reaching out for her hand. "We've got to cross before Sleeping Beauty wakes up."

"Sleeping Beauty?" She says shaking her head.

I let out a small laugh. "After poetry, we move on to fairy tales."

I kiss her on lips and we are back outside and through the woods. Through the little white house that still stands there as a tomb. She gets up and over the fence this time around quickly and then slipping through the night shadows of Portland, I leave her there at 37 Brooks sleeping on the sofa.

The last thing I do is kiss her again good night, telling her that I have an early shift at the labs.

She mutters, 'okay' as I walk away. I turn in the doorway, and whisper to myself.

"I love you."


	18. Chapter 18

eighteen

Walking to the labs this morning the sunrise looks a little bit more lazy than usual. I walk slow and deliberate. I don't even care if a regulator stops me and ask me for my IDs, it is like I have a cloak today, of invincibility and nothing nor no one in this city can hurt me. It should be a piece of cake, get in at five, check the deliveries, inventory them, and then get off at noon and of course run not walk to 37 Brooks. I can still feel her skin on my lips can still hear her heartbeat, calm mine. The stars that were in the sky last night, I still see them when I close my eyes.

"Hey Warren," I hear someone yell.

I look up and see the delivery guy standing there with the manifesto report. It has been happening ever since I met Lena, the moments of time lost, thinking of her. It is a world away from here, it is the sand castles by the ocean. I grab out the pen from my shirt, and start to check over the inventory listed. It seems heavier than usual.

"Hey Sam, inventory is a lot larger than usual," I say to the delivery guy. Sam has been delivering supplies from nearby Boston for years. It was the largest city, other than New York that was part of the Zombie republic. They made all of the cure medicine down in Boston, out of some University. Well that was the only type of information that Bolt had.

"You are telling me," he says cracking his back. "Had to stop twice to get enough gas on the highway, almost didn't make it on time. They kept on telling something about a coming change and they wanted to have this new batch or something to test."

It was then that I remembered the last drop, and the new technique for the procedure. The thing that I believe people were asking for was a procedure that can be given earlier in the adolescent process. It was something that some idiot Fineman wanted in New York. The stupidity of people never surprises me. They think that by getting it safe earlier, that they will be saving people. I honestly think it is fear of people being allowed to think to choose, or it could be the fear of letting people leave, that they feel the need to make it about some made up disease. The thing that I am having a hard time understanding is this, why the increase in inventory, what are they planning. I wonder, did they find a way to make it safer earlier?

Scanning the list, I see the increase production of cure procedures, there at the very bottom of the list. It is what finally causes me to remember, the sand castle and the ocean waves coming to destroy the world we created. The thing that I had been wishing I could forget, and just pretend that it isn't real. It is that very notion that feels like a punch in the stomach, a quick strong deep punch that goes in further and further, taking every little bit of breathe I have.

The clipboard falls and I have to put my hands on my knees a little to steady myself.

"Hey," Sam says. "You alright?"

I stick out my hand, and wave it off like it is nothing, but inside I know that it is more than just emotion, it is so intense that it has physically affected me.

"Yeah, sorry," I say. "Think something I ate didn't quite agree with me."

I pick up the clipboard and sign the inventory in. He looks concerned but not enough to do anything but his job. I look at my watch and let out a sigh of relief as I see that it is almost the end of my shift. The thought though, is still there, and it hasn't gone away, I think it is only two weeks. I try to search my mind, for the clues she gave me, a definitive number, but we never really talked about it, I guess neither one of us wanted to know, or really wanted to believe it.

'How much time do we have?'

It is the question that echoes all the way as I pedal to the Highlands. It is what I think about when I sit resting on the tree. It is what I dream about, a land filled with sand disappearing into a black hole. The nightmare of running away from the hole, trying to hold onto to sand, only to watch it slip away, a frivolous struggle that you know you cannot win. It is what haunts me, when I awake to find that Lena is not here. I stare at my watch, and know that something is wrong, she is never late not on this. I stand and look down the street, and see no one coming. Something is wrong. It doesn't feel right; it doesn't feel like it did before. I walk through the places that I think she would be. I walk inside the store and find that she isn't there. If I had known where Hana lived, I would go there too, but the next place that I go to is a street over on Cumberland. I think I see her; it looks like her there standing on the porch. I want to shout and wave, I want to run up to her and kiss her over and over, I want to hold her and twirl her around.

Looking around me of course, at the open windows and I know that I don't think it would be a wise choice. I walk slowly, trying not to make any sudden movements, but when I am finally there, I see something that I had not yet been prepared for.

'You know that in a couple of days, she will get her matches…but you know she_ will _have the procedure and then…everything will change…'

Everything has changed. Everything and I am the only still thinking in sand castles. The way she holds his hand, and the way he looks at me, like the way I would have if I was in his position. His face turns from a curiosity to one of annoyance.

"It's okay. She's my pair," he says yelling it out to me.

'His Pair…His…?' It repeats over and over and everything just slows down. My hands immediately ball up into a fist and my first reaction is to yell back. "Your pair? She isn't your anything." I want to go up to him and just beat him until I cannot see his smug face anymore. The fire that burns inside me creeps up and all I want to do is let it consume me, like it did so many years ago when I burned down that house. My hands start to shake and it would be so easy just to let go. It would be a welcomed delight. It is then, that I hear it come in like a whisper, a memory that I wish I never had, that I could forget.

'Did you ever think what if there was someone inside? What would be your answer then?'

It takes everything that I have inside of me to hold myself and do what I don't want, but know that I have to. I don't want her to see me; her eyes would break whatever strength I had been able to put up. I can already feel my legs giving out again. My breathe shallows and I have a hard time focusing. Turn and I don't think, I don't feel, I just run.

My feet cannot move fast enough, it is like running in water. There is no place, there is no where that I could run to, to hide, to forget the memories that I have. If the world could just open up and swallow me whole, I think it would be better, I think it would be easier to accept.

It is only when I feel the pain in my chest that I finally slow to a walk, and then finally stop. A distant roar catches my ears, and then my head turns to the left. It is there that I realize where I am. It is like something inside of me knew where I was going and yet if I thought it, I wouldn't be able to even make it. I walk without thinking until the terrain became uneven, until I heard the roar grow and finally couldn't help it and my energy just gave out.

There weren't that many people, and the few that were there, didn't even turn to look at me. I could be bleeding here, and no one would care. Sitting there I just let the day drift away. I watch as a couple walk along the beach side by side. They don't really talk to each other; they just walk along as if strangers bonded by some sort of duty. Would it be easier to just have the procedure, to have them remove it all? Can I live like that, walking like an empty shell, missing the pain that would remind me that I was alive? Is it true that it is better to know love, and experience it, then to never have?

I think about Lena and his sister, imagine what it was like back then. To see Lena run around before her mother was taken. To be able to see Lena, with her carefree life, the laughter, the playing in the shore, hearing her sister calling to her to help build the sand castle, it is the only thing that can mend this broken heart. Her hair flowing in the wind as she ran to and from the water, her happiest moments lost in the ocean. I think of the memories that she will probably lose when she would have the procedure.

One by one, people started to leave until, when I turn and look, I don't see anyone.

The pain, it is all that I feel. Come on Alex, you knew it was going to happen. There is nothing you can do to change the way things are around here. The pain is a new kind of pain though, deep within my bones, I hurt all over and yet I don't want to stop it from hurting. I now know what Browning meant, what she had long discovered all those years ago.

'I love thee with a love I seemed to lose…'

I stand and walk back to 37 Brooks, back to the place where we were the happiest. If it is going to be the way it is, if I am going to lose her, then it will be better that she remembers me this way. Happiness is so far and in-between in this place, and even if you do find it, it is always like a vapor, here today and gone tomorrow. If life here in Portland for her was going to be that way, and she had already decided then I am going to have to show her the most happiness she could withstand these last couple of days, to her the memory of what it was like.. That she will know that for a small part of her life, she was loved so deeply.

I walk upstairs and remember that the rooms of the master bedroom collapsed after that rainfall. It was the one time that we spent indoor and watched the rain. I wonder though, the memory of her mother would it be considered a sad one? The only thing that I could think of is what she told me in the trailer; how she wishes she could stay there with me. It takes me all afternoon to clean up the room, and break open the roof. The hammer destruction to the roof is welcomed therapy and does allow me to work through it. It is there that I see the stars coming out. I place the blanket on the ground, lying down to see if the view was perfect. I must have moved that darn blanket like twenty times until I felt that it was perfect.

I think about what is missing and remember the candles and the books surrounding the bed. Going through the nearby houses, I find old cans, mugs, and cups and putting candles in each of them I light them. The books and the games I stack them around the blanket. It is then that I hear something downstairs. It is the loud cries of someone. I look down the hallway and at first I thought I might have imagined it, but now that I am in the hallway I hear it louder.

The hallway is dark but the light of the moon give it a dim silver color which makes my heart jump just a little. It is then that I think I hear her voice through the cries, and know who it is. At the top of the stairs I see her there curled on the sofa crying. I walk down the stairs and finally I close the gap between us. The way she cries, runs a pain down my whole body, it is as if I wish I could just take upon her the pain and leave her again with just the happiness. Placing my hand on her neck, she slowly turns around.

"Lena," I say.

She just looks at me, and with those eyes that I long to see everyday, that I wish I could dream of, every moment, I reach out and wipe a tear from her cheek with my thumb, caressing her cheek.

"Lena," I say softly as to reassure her that it is okay. She stands to her feet and then wipes her eyes with the back of her palm.

"You got… my… note," she says trying to compose herself through the tears.

"Note?" I respond quizzically.

"I left you a note at the Governor," she says. "I wanted you to meet me here."

"I didn't get it," I say. "I just came to…"

I wanted to say to finish the surprise that I had for her, but of course she interrupts me by putting up her hand and lowering her face to the ground, obviously trying to shield herself from a painful respond.

"Stop…listen,…listen, about today…it wasn't my idea. Carol said I had to meet him, and I couldn't get a message to you. And then we were standing there and I was thinking about you, and the Wilds, and how everything is so changed and how there's no time, there's no more time for us, and for a second…a single second…I wished I could go back to how things were before."

She pauses and places her hands on her mouth. It was confusing to what she meant. Go back to how things were before she knew me, or before when we first got to know each other. It hurts and stings just a little, but maybe, just maybe it would be better if she moves on, moves forward and the procedure removes it all.

"But I swear I didn't really wish it. I would never have – if I'd never met you I could never have – I didn't know what anything _meant_ before you, not really…" she continues after the long pause.

I pull her towards me and hold her in my arms. The way she feels is like we were made for each other, how perfectly she fits. She smells so wonderful, that I bury my head into her hair, and finally whisper, 'shhh' into her ear. Holding her in my arms, I wish I could just disappear with her. My arms tighten and all I want to do is to show her how much I love her.

"I'm not mad at you, Lena," I say.

"But you…you took everything away. All of our stuff," she says into my chest, vibrating my shirt.

A small glimmer of hope springs inside of me. I could see that she actually meant what she said, and for the first time, she was letting herself come before everyone. Could it be that she would believe that a life outside of Portland was possible? I look away not wishing to go down this road, because I so want to. It is what I wished everyday that I was with her, but it isn't fair for her, it isn't true happiness. It is what we had always feared would happen, and although it was foolish to believe that if we never said it wouldn't be real, it was time to live outside the sand castles and in dreams, it was time to live in reality, the harsh reality of our prison.

"We always knew this would happen. We knew that we didn't have much time." I say.

"But – but…," she starts and I could see the tears begin to come to her eyes as they do to mine. I try my hardest to keep my face shielded in the shadows so that she couldn't see the tears. It is the hardest thing, not to give in. I place both my hands on her face, cupping them, wiping the tears away my thumbs.

"Don't cry, okay? No more crying," I say kissing the tip of her nose. No more pain, it is time that we live these moments, in true happiness, that our memories now are filled with them, so that we would never forget each other.

I take her hand in mines, and whisper to her, "I want to… show you something." The words catch in my throat as I try to hold back the coming emotion. They may very well be the last time that I see her. It could be the last time that I hold her hand, or even the last time that I could kiss her. It would never be the last time I think of her, and long to be with her. Her happiness means everything to me, so going up the stairs; I just want her to see the stars one more time. Her hand tightens and I look back at her.

"This way," I say taking her into down the hallway to the master bedroom. I open the first door and pull her through the doorway. She wakes slowly into the room and then I hear her gasp.

"Well? What do you think?" I say anxious to know if she understood what I was trying to do. She walks into the room, looking around and studying the books, and the sleeping bag that I put on top of the blanket that we used outside. Looking up to the open roof she can see the stars of Portland. It is obviously less visible inside of Portland but at least in the Highlands where there is no electricity it is somewhat visible.

She turns around at me, with this love in her eyes, that I saw only in the Wilds.

"Alex," she says and I don't wait, I don't stop myself, I lean into her and kiss her placing my hand on the small of her back. I feel her back arch into me and all I do is with my hand I slowly lift her up into the kiss.

I whisper into her ear. "Do you see them? The stars?"

She looks up to the sky, nod, and then finally smiles.

"Each star that you can see and not see, symbolizes one thing that I love about you," I say without hesitation. Her eyes open wide and I know that she still can't say it, still so scared of it. I explain that, "it's too dangerous to go back to the Wilds. So I brought the Wilds here. I thought you would like it."

"I do. I – I love it," she finally says as she places her hand on my chest. The rhythm of my heart beats evenly when she is near me, and irregularly when she is not. She is the reason why happiness exists now in my heart. She is the reason why love flows again through it, long forgotten and trapped inside after my parents died. This is our moment, and if we are going to live in it, it is better to get started.

"Lena," I say. "I know we don't have much time, like you said. We hardly have any time at all…"

She interrupts me protesting, burying her face in my chest, wrapping her arms around me. It is the best feeling, of being wanted, of being loved. I wonder though, would it be, can it be, possible…to keep her?

"I won't do it. I won't go through with it. I can't. I want to be with you. I _need_ to be with you."

The words fill my heart with such joy, that I lose all my focus, and all my senses. The plan falls flat and all I want to do is to give her what she wants, it is after all what I want as well. I lift her head to meet mine.

"You don't…have to go through with it," I say. "Lena, you _don't_ have to do anything. We could…run away…together. To the Wilds. Just go and never come back. Only – Lena, we _couldn't _ever come back. You know that, right? They'd kill us both, or lock us up forever…but Lena, we could _do_ it."

Her arms release her grip and I see her feet take a step back. It is there that I realized that she didn't mean it. It was just a hope, a dream, to her. It wasn't real, it wasn't true, and she just said it because she didn't want to lose me.

"You weren't serious," I say lowering my voice realizing the truth. "You didn't mean it."

"No, I did mean it, it's just…" she says.

"It's just that you're scared," I say walking towards the window. Doesn't she realize that I am as well? What if after all this time, and if we decide to go, that she wouldn't want me anymore. That it was all to her the disease and she really didn't have feelings for me.

"I'm not scared. I'm just…" she starts to say, obviously trying to make me feel better.

"It's okay," I say putting my hand up to my eyes, clearing out the tears that were forming. It is hard. It is hard to say goodbye, it just seems so final, that my mind says to do it, and my heart says to hold on. "You don't have to explain."

"My mother," she bursts out saying. I turn and look at her. It is not the answer I was expecting, and looking at her face it wasn't the excuse that she was expecting either. "I don't want to be like her. Don't you understand? I saw what it did to her, I saw how she was…it killed her, Alex. She left me, left my sister, left it all. All for this thing, this thing inside of her. I _won't_ be like her."

It was the only thing that was real. It wasn't about the not wanting to be with me. It wasn't even about the fear of being in the Wilds. But it isn't what I expected. I wish I could hold her, to tell her that I would never leave her. That love doesn't cause you to leave, it causes you to stay.

"Because she wasn't cured?" I ask.

Her tears start to come more freely and it isn't a loud sob but a silent one. It is only for a minute and she says something that I barely hear. "It's not just that…she was so different from everybody else. I knew that – that she was different, that we were different – but it wasn't scary at first. It just felt like our little delicious secret. Mine, and hers, and Rachel's, too, like we were in a cocoon. It was…it was amazing."

She pauses and I walk towards her.

"We kept all the curtains drawn so no one could see in. We used to play this game where she would hide in the hallway and we would try to run past her and she would leap out and grab us – playing goblin, she called it. It always ended in a tickle war. She was always laughing. We were all always laughing.…"

The thought, the memory, how purely innocent and how special it is to her. I know that she is sharing something that she had never shared with anyone. I don't think that she even shared this with Hana. I could just imagine it, seeing them both running through the hallway, and being caught. I could see the smiles and hear the laughter. I close my eyes and see the little girl running carefree. I can hear the hurt in her voice and in her words; this memory although it was a happy one, hurt her in the end. Am I hurting her by wishing to take her? What if I left, would she be hurt, would she say it was because of the disease? What could I do, how could I win?

"Then every so often we would got too loud, she would clap her hands over our mouths and get all tense for a second, listening. I guess she was listening for the neighbors, to make sure none of them were alarmed. But no one ever came," she says. "Sometimes she would make us blueberry pancakes for dinner, as a treat. She picked the blueberries herself. And she was always singing. She had a beautiful voice, just gorgeous, like honey…"

She stops to catch her breath, more than likely to hold back the tears of remembering, the pain of remembering.

"She used to dance, too. I told you that. When I was little I would stand with my feet on top of hers. She would wrap her arms around me and we would move slowly around the room while she counted out the beat, tried to teach me about rhythm. I was terrible at it, clumsy, but she always told me I was beautiful," she says wiping her tears. "It wasn't all good, not all the time. Sometimes I would get up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom and I'd hear her crying. She always tried to muffle it by turning into her pillow, but I knew. It was terrifying when she cried. I'd never seen a grown-up cry before, you know? And the way she did it, the wailing…like some kind of animal. And there were days she didn't get out of bed at all. She call those her black days."

It reminds me so much of Beatrice, but not in the way that she would understand. The thing is, whenever they would drink alcohol, Gabriel would drink too much. He would talk about the good old days and what he missed the most. Beatrice would never talk about the good old days, but would stare a mirror. I asked her once about it.

'You know what I wish the most,' she says looking at me.

'What?' I say back then. I was probably seventeen I want to say, although I may have been older.

'To remember how to cry,' she says with these sad looking eyes. 'The painful memories of before the cure. To feel something, anything really. My body doesn't remember how to cry, so I can't.'

I move closer to Lena now, and see that she would lose that, this, right here. The ability to express herself, the ability to feel anything at all, it would be taken. I want to tell her, but I stay quiet looking at her.

"I used to pray that God would cure her of the black days. That he would keep her – keep her safe for me. I wanted us to stay together. Sometimes it seemed like the praying worked. It was good most of the time. It was more than good."

I hold her and she continues to whisper near me.

"Don't you get it? She left all that. She gave it up – for that _thing._ Love. _Amor deliria nervosa – _whatever you want to call it. She gave _me _up."

I rub her back and start to try and comfort her. How do you promise someone something that you could never really fulfill? If I told her that I would never leave her, how would I keep that promise? It is an empty one, a promise like telling someone that you would behave when you were smaller, when you don't know what would cause you to misbehave. The only words that can bring truth to them, is the ones that Beatrice told me when she found out that my father died.

"I am sorry, Lena," I whisper. Her body starts to convulse and I know that the deepest pain that she has held all this time, is finally coming out. Those things that we never admit to ourselves because we think it would kill us are the things that truly keep us prisoner.

"Everyone thinks she killed herself because she couldn't stand to have the procedure again. They were still trying to cure her, you know. It would have been her fourth time. After her second procedure they refused to put her under – they thought the anesthesia was interfering with the way the cure was taking. They cut into her _brain,_ Alex, and she was _awake."_

This is barbaric. The very thought of it, brings an anger that I wish I could just do what the rebellion had always wanted. I wish I could just burn down the labs. I mean I could, I know where everything is, I know where the weak spots are. It wouldn't even be that hard to do. If I only had access to explosives.

"But I know that's not really why," she says shaking her head. "My mom was brave. She wasn't afraid of pain. That was the whole problem, really. She wasn't afraid. She didn't want to be cured; she didn't want to stop loving my dad. I remember she told me that once, just before she died. 'They're trying to take him from me,' she said. She was smiling so sadly. 'They're trying to take him, but they can't.' She used to wear one of his pins around her neck on a chain. She kept it hidden most of the time, but that night she had it out and was staring at it. It was this strange, long, silver dagger-thing, with two bright jewels in the hilt, like eyes. My dad used to wear it on his sleeve. After he died she wore it every day, never took it off even to bathe…"

The thought comes rushing back. The woman in the Crypts, the one Thomas was taking care of. I can remember the same cross in her hand, carving out the word, 'love' over and over again. Could it be, that this woman was Lena's mother.

"What?" she asks. "Did I say something wrong?"

I shake my head. It has to be her, but why would they tell her that she died? What would it prove? If they had told her that she was locked up because she was sick, it would have made better sense. Lena could have visited her, could have been healed from it. Probably…

"How big was it? The pin, I mean." I ask trying to remember the size in my mind.

"The point isn't the pin, Alex the point is…" she starts to say.

"How big was it?" I say trying to get her to confirm it.

"I don't know. Like the size of a thumb, maybe," she says looking at me. It isn't that big, from what I can see, it is probably smaller than that. There is that doubt though, it could be still her.

"It was originally my grandfather's – made just for him, a reward for performing a special service for the government. Unique. That's what my dad always said, anyway."

I think about it in my head. I could bring her. It would be dangerous, it would be probably impossible. Thomas would have to know a way to get her in. I would have to tell him about Lena, I am pretty sure he would understand. I turn to her again.

"What are you doing tomorrow?" I ask.

She looks a little bit frustrated at me. "Were you even _listening_ to me?"

"Lena, please," I say. "Just answer me. Are you working?"

She nods no. "Not until Saturday….why?"

"You have to meet me. I have – I have something to show you."

She lets out a small laugh and then says, "you'll have to do better than that. Can you at least give me a hint?"

I take a deep breath, and I know that I don't want to get her hopes up, but it is the only way for her to come, to realize the importance of this.

"Lena," I say. "I think your mother is alive."

She stops and there it is like she just saw a ghost. It is like all blood has been drained out of her. I rush over to her, just as her legs give out. She feels so heavy in my arms, almost as if all of her weight is gone to falling. She looks at me, and at first tries to talk. Nothing comes out. I can see her throat close as she sucks in a gulp and then finally says.

"How? Where?"

I shake my head. "I don't know, but I think I might have saw her at the Crypts one day. Meet me tomorrow?"

She nods.

"Ten o'clock," I say.


	19. Chapter 19

nineteen

It was only a couple of minutes walking back with her. It was quiet, and we didn't really talk much on the way back. She did ask a couple of questions about the Crypts and how did I think it was her mother. It was a very guarded question, and I don't know if she really meant to ask it out loud of if she just wanted to say it to make it real. Her hands clasps in front, she walks with her head down, not really noticing if there are any regulators out making sweeps. It really is okay, I can understand her emotions and her disbelief. Once we are at the corner of her block she looks back at me in the shadows. Her eyes penetrate my walls, and go into my inner self, trying to reassure me about my attempt to leave Portland, or my declarations of love that I made. Nothing comes though, and I can see her struggle inside.

I close the small space that we have in between and wrap my arms around her. It is not the time, nor the place to try and convince her. It is quiet and I do not see anyone around, but the shadows can also hide people, the curtains of nearby homes can become screens for wandering eyes.

"Sssh," I whisper. "It will be okay. No need to say anything."

We separate and she looks around making sure that no one is there. The moon light catches her eyes and then finally she lets out a small smile before she leans in and kisses me.

"Thank you," she whispers. She turns around and then starts to walk slowly through the shadows making sure to keep quiet. It has been one roller coaster of a day. We are both going through many different emotions, but I wonder about something. If it is her mother, how can she leave Portland? It was that thought that ran though my dreams. The endless hallways filled with doors, running after Lena who chased her mother's ghost.

The alarm was blaring when my eyes finally opened. I stood up quickly and felt the headache come back. I don't even remember getting back to my apartment, or even climbing into my bed. Could be that I was so tired that my body continue to work on auto-pilot and I was unaware of it. Thinking back the last coupe of days, the midnight crossing to the Wilds, and the early morning shift the following day, not to mention the whole situation yesterday, and well I think I have been up for two maybe three days. The headache is mild and my body does ache as I try and sit up. It is as though the sunlight coming through the blinds act like small little hammers, beating on it profusely. Wait, I think to myself. The sunlight is too bright for it to be early.

"Crap," I say out loud looking for the alarm clock that I must have knocked behind my bed. There in the little space between the bed and the wall lied the alarm clock and its time blares as a shocking number.

"Nine?" I shout the adrenaline shooting through my body like electricity. "Crap, crap, crap…"

I quickly jump to my feet and run into the shower. The cold water on my head trying to get rid of the pain in my head, trying to shock myself awake, but of course the tingling sensation and the shivering is all I think about. Once out the shower I see my guard uniform, nicely pressed for my shift, the dress pants that we wear only for occasions of Evaluation days or when the higher officials visited the Labs, hung there in the dry cleaners bag. I take off the plastic from the pants and put them on quickly as I button down the white dress shirt with the government seal on its left hand pocket. Once I am all cleaned up, I grab the comb and brush back my hair, making sure that I look as official as I can. This is not a visit, it is an escort. Of course I do not have the authority to escort a possible infected person to the Crypts, but no one really knows this in the Crypts, and they have seen more than enough times to not question my official capacity.

I grab the ID badge as I run outside. The first thing that I noticed is the change in temperature, the stabbing knives of the cold weather. Standing on the stoop of the apartment complex, I look back up the stairs, thinking if I could just go back and grab my jacket. I look down to my watch and realize that I don't have enough time to get it and get to the Crypts in time. Kicking myself for not waking up earlier, I guess the pain in my joints from the cold weather, is penalty enough. The cool wind whipped through my body entering the inner most part, like a snake. I hesitated on the bike ride, knowing full well that the cold wind would not be something that was unwelcomed by my body. The desires however to both see her, and to be around her was what pushed me through it.

Coming around the bending in the downtown district, I stove my bike in an alley of the nearby store. A lot of the Crypts staff comes to this store to stock up on snacks and what not. The store clerk in the window was always a nice person. She always asked me how my day went and whether, you know pleasant conversation. This time though I make a gesture to my wrist and she waves knowing that the symbol means that I am late.

Walking towards the entrance of the Crypts I see her there waiting for me. We had decided to meet around the bend of the entrance just in case we need to go over the plan again.

I am selfish.

My head goes to the ground and the shame washes over me. How could I hope that, how could I wish that? I cross my arms and continue to walk trying to get rid of that thought.

I wish it wasn't her that Lena's mother was not in the Crypts, because then she could go, and we can be happy, or rather, I would be happy. It would be hard to accept, but her death many years ago caused her so much pain. Through the years she had learned to accept it, she still suffers from it. She could, leave if she could accept that it wasn't love to caused her mother to leave. There is the other side though, that I wish it wouldn't be. What if it is her mother? All these years, her family told her that she left them, and really she was taken prisoner. It is the memory of the person there carving the word, over and over again, could it be that the love wasn't for her husband Lena's father, but for her children? If it is her, she wouldn't leave, ever, with her mother there in that small room. Would I wish her to be healed and stay here or be damaged and leave with me?

"Hey," I say to her lowly trying to mask the inner disgust that I have. "Sorry I'm late."

We start to walk towards the entrance and she has a very innocent looking soft color shirt, and some muted pants. Her hair brushed and pulled back so that every detail of her face is visible. I wish though that I could just stop and erase everything, my selfishness, and my desire. Her anxiousness is not as evident as before. Could it be that she is becoming easier to hide her true emotions? I don't know if that is a good thing or bad. I could always read Lena, and know what she was thinking. Now, just looking at her so quiet and so un-readable it does get me a little nervous.

"That's okay," she says with a small crack in her voice. I smile at it, because she is still the sweet innocent Lena, not the hard emotionless person of a rebel, or a empty shelled zombie from the inside.

"Are you ready to do this?" I say lowly, trying to make sure that no guard hears me as we approach the guard hut.

"I think so," she says. "It might not even be her, right? You could be wrong."

I could be. There is that small chance that I could be wrong. I pray that I am. That we can just get this over with and get on with a decision. I don't know though, it is as if what she believes would be confirmed, that she died and left her here.

"Come on," I say leading her to the guard hut. It is wrong of me to wish that I was wrong, when all I want to do is keep her safe, and keep her happy. If she was here, her thoughts of abandonment would be gone, and filled with hope that she was trapped here all along.

The guard is in front of the hut looking at the underside of his shoes. Once we are a couple of feet, I make it a point to slide my foot on the loose gravel, so that it makes a noise. He looks up at us, and I show him my badge. He nods at me recognizing me. His facial expression does change when he sees that someone is behind me.

"There was an …_incident_ at her evaluation," I say. His eyes narrow a little as he looks down at her wrist, obviously thinking that she was going to be a prisoner here, and odd at her ability to not run when she had the chance.

I shift my weight cutting off his view of Lena's wrist. His eyes flick up back to mines and I smile comfortably.

"Nothing too severe. But her parents and my superiors ," I say tapping on the badge showing the Lab logo. "…though she might benefit from a little reminder about the dangers of disobedience."

He looks at me, and then his expression changes from calm to alert. His hands move to the rifle that he is carrying.

"What kind of incident?"

I lean forward, so that he can hear only my voice. It is to bring some sort of calm to him that it isn't that serious and that a weapon is not necessary.

"Her favorite color is the color of sunrise," I say remembering what she truly said wasn't that exactly but the color of grey.

He nods and his second hands moves off the rifle. I try and keep my breath level as my heart levels off. His feet begin to move as he tells me in a low voice. "Stand back while I get the gate."

He disappears behind the hut and the gates shudders as it begins to move. The creaking and the squealing of the gate causes her to flinch. For me it always reminded me of how my father must have seen it all those years ago. He couldn't any older than me when he was thrown in here. The faded grey buildings surround us as we walked into the courtyard. Its small windows always caused me to wonder why my father was in Ward Six where there were no windows.

As we cross the courtyard, her pace slows a little, and I have to look back to make sure that she keeps up with me. The last thing I need is to have someone question her, without me there. Finally we are in front of the entry way, and I pause at the door.

"Ready?" I ask.

"Yes," she softly responds.

Walking to the visitor's desk I see that it is Alice behind the desk. She smiles at me and I give her a small wave. It pays to know people here, and to have conversation and to know people's lives. It seems that they are cleaning the hallways because I see Alice has her medical mask on. Once every three weeks, the clean-up crew comes in and splash the hallways with a strong disinfected, which to me smells like a strong bleach. They do it to get out the human waste smells. Thomas would tell me that sometimes the mental patients cannot hold their bladder when they walk throughout the halls. That is why when you see the guards, they are always looking down and then ahead every couple of steps, to make sure that they don't slip on anything on the ground, or why the outside guard was checking the under sole of his boots.

"Alex," Alice says. "Who's that?"

"This young girl had an incident at her evaluations. Of course nothing too serious, but her parents and my boss wants me to you know 'show her around.'" I say.

"Oh…I know what you mean," she responds with a smile. "Trisha, came here when she was fourteen or so. Had them give her the deluxe tour. What is the young ladies name?"

I look at a blank piece of paper that I am using for Lena's information and approval. Alice can't really see what is or isn't written on the paper, as I have it on a clip board on top of other official papers.

"Magdalena Tiddle," I say repeating slowly her name pretending that I didn't know it. "Need me to spell it out for you?"

She nods no, and hands us our name tags. As I begin to walk towards the door. I stop and look back at Alice.

"Oh by the way, how is Trisha?" I ask. "She finally done with her boards?"

"You know how teenagers are," she says waving her hands. "They always want to know what is next in life, instead of enjoying it."

I nod, and give her a small wave. We remove our belts, and I talk a little with Walter the guard at the metal detector post. Lena is a little hesitant, and I have to tell her coldly to put her belt and shoes in the bin. She fumbles at the belt and finally places her shoes and belt on the bin. We get through the detector and then someone moves us into a small room. This is new, I think. I don't question it and go inside.

"Men to one side, and women to another," a guard said. Lena moves behind a screen. She gives me a quick glance and then goes behind. "Remove your shirt and pants," the guard says. I look at him a little confused. "New security procedure implemented after the incident."

I don't hesitate and remove my shirt and pants. They begin to pat me down making sure that I do not have anything hidden. Once done, they hand me my shirt and pants, and tell me to get dress, that my shoes and belt will be waiting for me outside. Once outside I can see that Lena is a little shaken by it all. I want to reach out and grab her hand, tell her that it is okay, tell her that she is safe with me.

I stand and I motion to her to follow me down the hall. The guard that is near the door tells me.

"Wards one through five only."

It is an odd thing, as I was never restricted to any of the wards. Something must have happened. Everyone is very serious but still nice to me.

"You got it," I say looking at him. We walk through the hallway and then finally through the doors out of Ward one. The next ward is empty and I look at my watch. Eleven, perfect. It is the shift change time and we would have about fifteen minutes before the next shift.

"How does everybody know you here?" Lena asks me when she looks around and finds no one is around.

"I come by a lot," I say. Looking at the next door and finally down the hall, I see the large metal door in the distance. "My father's here. That's why I come."

The air is now sad and she knows that I have told her that my father died. It wasn't the best conversation, but it was one of the most vulnerable one. She had pressed me to know about my family, why I called Beatrice and Gabriel my aunt and uncle when they were not related to me at all. Or the way I called Christine as my mom, when she really wasn't. I just had to tell her that everyone in the Wilds or the Rebellion was family.

"I thought you said your father was dead."

I stop a little, and just cannot let myself lose control. I have to maintain myself. "He is."

"What are you…" she starts to ask and stops when the smell of the next room greets us. It is enough to stop anyone from talking. I see the tree that twists in the dim light, no leafs, nothing but a small bird singing. I look up and see the grey skies and know that it is going to rain. There are no cameras here, and knowing the shift, no one will come to this small area for a while. I see the small stone a couple of feet away. Looking down all I can say in my mind is this.

'Hey dad, I found someone like mom.'

I am sure that he would be happy to know this. I never knew him, but I am sure that he loved her. To be able to live and die here and let her live outside, it had to be love. Inside of me stirs emotion and I know that if I stay here much longer I will not be able to continue.

"Here." I say pointing at the rock. "Right here. That's where my father is."

She looks down at the grave and says his name out loud.

"Warren Sheathes," she says. "Your father?"

I nod and can feel a cold wind find its way up my pant leg and up my chest. I shiver at the feeling. "Yeah."

"He was here?" she asks.

"For fourteen years," I say as I draw a circle in the ground. All those years, I think to myself, never seeing outside, never knowing if she made it or not. It would be a torture in itself. The thought of it, on how many years he survived. I wonder though, what drove him to continue. I know if it was me, I wouldn't be able to past the first night.

"What happened?" she asks quietly. "I mean, what he…?"

I turn up at her; it is the same question that I asked myself that night when Beatrice told me. What did he do to deserve this? It angered me the more I asked, because the only thing that I came up with, was two answer.

'Nothing.'

'Love my mother.'

"What did he do?" I say. "I don't know. What all the people who end up in Ward Six do. He thought for himself. Stood up for what he believed in. Refused to give in."

"Ward Six?" she asks.

I look away from her at the door that led to Ward Six. "The dead ward. For political prisoners, mostly. They're kept in solitary confinement. And no one ever gets released." I point at the stones around us. "Ever."

She tries to reach out to hold me, but stops when I take a small step back.

"I'm so sorry, Alex," she says. I know she means it, and I know what she wishes that she could do. It was the same way that I felt when she told me about her mother. It is when I realize that if I could take that pain, I would.

"He and my mom were only sixteen when they met. Can you believe that? She was only eighteen when she had me," I say squatting to clean my father's stone. It was the only thing that Christine knew for sure. It was the story that my mother told her. "They wanted to run away together, but he was caught before they could finalize a plan. I never knew he'd been taken into custody. I just thought he was dead. My mom thought it would be better for me, and nobody in the Wilds knew enough to correct her. I think for my mom it was easier to believe he _had_ really died. She didn't want to think of him rotting in this place."

I look at his name there. I remember the number of times it took me to write it down and to do it so that nobody knew.

"My aunt and uncle told me the truth when I turned fifteen. They wanted me to know. I came here to meet him, but…" The memory too painful to remember, too buried to want to bring up. "Anyway, it was too late. He was dead…had been dead for a few months, and buried here, where his remains wouldn't _contaminate_ anything."

I stand up and then finally look at her.

"Ready?"

She nods and I smile. She looks down at the stone again and then finally up to me.

"Your name….Alex Warren."

It was a lucky thing that my last name was my father's first. It would bring a smile to my face, when people would call me 'Warren.' I wonder though, what he like was, how did he look like.

"Assigned to me," I say.

"Your real name is Alex Sheathes," she says and I nod. She starts to walk to the next door, and I go in front of her. The next hallways and doors go without any conversations. She slows down and I know what is going on in her mind. It was the fear creeping up in her heart. Her mother wasn't in the mental wards, or even in the criminal one. She wasn't in Ward Four or Ward Five, it was only once that I was able to see Ward Six, and even then Thomas had to escort me.

I look back and see her hands go from in front of lap clasped, to up to her throat, her fear coming to pass as we take each a step.

I see the door. The one door that I wish I didn't have to go through. It was the same door that I wish Thomas never took me. If I didn't go there, then I wouldn't have known, or even remembered that her mother could possibly be there.

"Alex," I hear her voice strained as we reached the door. I turn around and I can see the tears begin to weld up in her eyes. It was the last thing I wanted to do but I knew it was necessary if it could take away all the pain that she had.

"I'm sorry, Lena." I say as I open the door to Ward Six.

It is like all color had disappear, and in front of me, was a girl who was so scared of continuing that she would rather continue living in lie than facing it head on.

"Maybe we shouldn't," she says rubbing her hands and looking down. "He said – he said we weren't allowed."

My immediate response is to try and comfort her, so I start to try and grab her arms and to tell her that it would be okay. It is there that I hear a creak behind me and realize that Thomas must be coming to meet us.

"Don't worry," I say. "I have friends in here."

She responds with a small squeak in her voice. "It's probably not even her. It was probably just a big mistake. We shouldn't have come in the first place. I want to go home."

It was the same reaction I had when they told me that my father was in the Crypts. I didn't want to believe it. I wanted to believe that he had escape and was probably out there somewhere. Or that he probably wasn't really caught in Portland and is living his life in a house somewhere. Probably with a family, and well probably he was happy. Finally able to find some sort of happiness. Why would I want to ruin that for him? It was that idea though that kept me from going that day, and waiting a couple of weeks before I simply had to know. By then it was simply too late, and if I had gone when they told me, probably…things would have been different.

"Lena, come on. You have to trust me," I say moving my hand over her forearm. "Okay? Trust me."

"I do trust you, it just…if she isn't here…well, that's bad. But if she is… I think… I think it might be even worse."

I think about it, and noticed that I don't deserve her. She would rather believe that her mother was dead and free than realize that she isn't and is trapped here. It is something new that I love about her.

"You have to know, Lena," I say.

Finally she thinks about it and nods. It is going to be hard to know that if she is here that she would be trapped, she will still have her. I something at that moment, looking at her, wishing that her mother was still alive, but hating the fact that she was here, it was the decision that I had to live with. I know that I couldn't be wrong, and that when she sees her, she will stay here. My decision now is that I will have to live with the fact that I may not ever get the chance to love her.

Walking into the Ward, I look for the welcomed face of Thomas. In the corner I turn and see someone sitting on a stool. It was the place where Thomas would be. Today he would be here, he never missed, he never took a day off, and he was always here when he was scheduled.

Everything in my body goes tight as I see the guy flash and the person stand. The sights go up and I immediately think, could I have had the wrong day? I dismiss the idea, if there is something that I pride myself on, is attention to the smallest details. No time to do anything, but improvise.

"Can't be in here," the guard says to me. "Restricted area."

"I – I thought Thomas would be here," I say obviously trying to stall for a story. The one thing that I told Lena, was when you don't plan, you make mistakes, and when you don't think of the what-ifs you are bound to fail.

"Oh, he's here, all right. He's _always_ here, nowadays," the guard says smiling. The smile. It is there that I see the horror, in his voice, in the words that he said. Thomas was caught, which means that we are in more danger than ever. We are on our own here.

"What do you know about Thomas?" He asks with a smooth tone, almost as if he knows.

Come on Alex, think, think, think. How far am I from him? Can I disable him before he gets a shot? I know that there are no cameras here, as this Ward doesn't officially exist, it is the only way the government here in Portland gets answers about the rebellion, they would do anything to get information.

What are the possible exit points? It is an end hallway, the only way out is the way we came in. The possible escapes? That is the only problem, we are not only at a dead end, and we are below ground. There is only one way to keep her from harm, I have to talk my way out.

"We heard there was some kind of problem, that's all," I say referring to my training. It is what they taught me, it was the only thing that they taught me, and quizzed me, and test me, over and over and over.

'You don't tell them the story. You have _them_ tell you the story.' Gabriel says.

'How?' I ask.

'You have to pick up on cues. The word in the sentence that does not fit, or that the other person emphasizes on.' Gabriel explains.

'I…I don't understand,' I say.

He puts his hands on his head rubbing his forehead in frustration. He starts to walk back and forth, slowly.

'You have to,' he says. 'It is that important.'

He sighs and then looks at me.

'Look Alex,' he says. 'Just listen to my sentence and pick out what doesn't belong there.'

We must have spent hours and hours every day practicing. Even when I came to visit, he would test me by giving me false information to get me to catch it, to be able to provide a good story to back it up, or to tie in with already existing stories. It became a very way to pass the time and it did bring Gabriel and me together.

If my first question, introduced the subject of Thomas, then the follow-up question by this guard means that Thomas was the focused of something. Which is of course confirmed by the fact that Thomas is alive and still here, more than likely being beaten for information. He is still here, so means that the government doesn't want this information out, Ward Six after all doesn't really exist on any papers, and Thomas's identity would have been deleted from the system.

"We heard there was some kind of problem, that's all." I say. It is the next thread, to get him to give us the next piece. It is a bit of a reach. To introduce that we know something, he might ask what we know, what sort of problem. If he is locked in here, means that they found out that he is a sympathizer, so that is our out just in case. I have to become the one thing that I hate, the one thing that I despise…I have to become one of them.

"Took you long enough," the guard responds. "Thomas has been out for months. All the better for CID, I guess. It's not the kind of thing we wanted to publicize."

The CID, of course, it is who come against now. The Controlled Information Department is the shadows of everything. It takes the story and either spins it or covers it up. If they were expecting them, it gives us the reason why I am here. The only thing it hasn't included was the reason why Lena is.

"You know how it is. Impossible to get a straight answer from anyone over there," I say.

"You're telling me," he says smiling. It means that he has accepted the premise, that he has bought it. He then jerks the conversation, to her.

"Who's she?"

The way he distance himself, it is the same way I have to do. I cannot show him that I know Lena, or it will lead to the question on why she is here.

"She's nobody," I say. "I'm supposed to be showing her the Crypts, that's all. A re-educational process, if you know what I mean."

"I can't let you back there," he says lowering his gun. It is the action that I wanted. He sees me as he does. The animal doesn't see Lena as a person, but probably as an animal?

"You're just doing your job," I say giving him praise so that he realize that I understand him. It doesn't get us where we want though, it only stops him from asking questions about me and her. How do I get it to a place where I want it, I wonder.

"So you're Thomas replacement?" I say trying to get him to open up. Trying to personalize him, trying to get him to tell me something personal, and if I can do that, then I can get him where I want him.

"That's right. Frank Dorset. Got reassigned from Three in February – after the incident." He says with a grimace.

"Tough breaks, huh?" I say.

"Quieter up here, that's for sure. Nobody in or out. At least, _almost_ nobody,"he says.

It is the way in. I have his name, I have where he is from, and now I have what he misses. Ward three is a mental wing, and well there are tons of nurses there. It is about the conversation, it is about not being alone.

"So how'd you hear about Thomas?" he asks. It is a change, it wasn't expected, but it was a wall that he put up. The official story has to be something that he could believe, something that he would understand.

"Rumors floating here and there," I say casually. "You know how it is."

This is a way to connect a way, to get him to understand that the wall he just put up is not necessary. It was a test and I don't know if I am passing it or not.

"I know how it is," the guard says. "But the CID wasn't too happy about it. Had us on lock for a few months. What exactly did you hear, anyway?"

It was _the_ question. The story has to match what the CID would be upset about. The only thing that I know is now is the time to play my out card.

"Heard he might have sympathies on the other side," I say.

Frank lessens his breathing and I know that I have passed the test. It was after all the real reason he was keeping up the conversation, to see if I was part of the other side. If I knew Thomas, then there was a possibility that I was part of what he was planning. The only thing I don't know, is what did he plan and how did he get caught.

"That's right. Came as a total shock to me. 'Course I hardly knew him – saw him sometimes in the break room, once or twice in the shitter, that's about it. Kept to himself, mostly. I guess it makes sense. Must have been getting chatty with the Invalids."

The only thing I have to find out is how did he get caught, to see if I am in danger, to see if anyone is in danger.

"What was the tip off?" I ask.

"No tip-off, exactly," he says. "It figures he must have known something about the escape. He was in charge of cell inspections. And the tunnel didn't just sprout up overnight."

The words, the action, and I know that what he did. The reason why the CID is upset is because they cannot confirm that he is one of sympathizers. They suspect him, so that is why he is still alive. The thing is that why would he risk it? The escape should have been discussed and it would have to be cleared through a lot of people. Even what I was deciding with Lena of leaving Portland goes against everything, and they would never let me do it. After all I am positioned in the labs, a good plant, a good place for information.

"The escape?" Lena blurts out.

"Sure," Frank says looking at me. "You must have heard about it."

This is so what we don't need right now. This changes the flow, it puts us at a disadvantage because we don't know how public this was, or who knew. If I say yes we knew, and it was kept quiet, then we are in danger of being considered part of the plan. If I say no we didn't know, then it closes the opportunity to continue this story and we are now back to the question, of why are we even here. It brings us back to the story of Lena's tour. He might even ask for the papers of transport which of course I do not have.

"A little of this, a little of that. Nothing confirmed." I say. The words come out before I have chance to review them. Stupid, stupid, the confirmed part, too definitive.

"Oh, it's confirmed," Frank says laughing. "Happened back in February. We got the alarm from Thomas, as a matter of face. 'Course if he was in on it, she might have had a lead time of six, seven hours."

She? It is then that I realize we have to go. She will not be here. That is who Thomas truly cared about, the only reason why he was in Ward Six. The way he talked to me about her, it was as if he owed her this. I am sure he must have got her out.

It is then I hear a commotion behind me and see that Lena has to support herself with the walls. She must be thinking the same thing.

"What's wrong with her?" Frank asks me.

"Air," she says. "It's the air in here."

It is the best answer that she could have given. Her innocence is the only thing we have going for us. It is the only way to break up the current story. Get him to focus on something else.

"You think it's bad out here," he says laughing at the response. "It's paradise compared to the cells."

We have our way out. It is what she wanted, but looking at her, at her face and I know that she wants to see it for herself. It is the most dangerous thing that we can do, to push where there is no opening. Gabriel would have my head if he knew what I was doing. It was putting me and everyone else at risk. We could have just have easily said okay we are going to leave because Lena didn't feel well, but her eyes told me that she needed to know.

I lean in to talk to Frank, trying to use the new found connection that we have.

"Listen, just let us in for a minute. That's all it will take: a minute. You can tell she's already scared out of her mind. I had to come all the way out here for this, day off and everything. I was going to go to the pier, maybe try out some fishing. Point is, if I bring her home and she's not straightened out…well, you know, chances are I'll just have to haul out here again. And I only have a couple of days off, and summer's almost over…"

"Why all the trouble?" Frank asks. "If she's causing problems, there's an easy way to fix her up."

It is the cure. The way people think fixes everything. We are going to have to go with a quick lie, and hope he doesn't catch it. I did mention before that she was nobody, but now the only reason why I would push is because I have to make her a somebody. It has to be someone that he would know but wouldn't follow up on.

"Her father's Steven Jones, commissioner at the labs. He doesn't want to do an early procedure, no trouble, no violence or mess. Looks bad, you know."

It does help though. The story wouldn't be official, the paperwork wouldn't be on the books. Her identity would have to be changed. It is all about playing it off the books. It is what drives his curiosity.

He looks at her for a second and lifts an eyebrow curious on the story.

"Come on," he says standing up. "Five minutes."

He turns and starts to work on the door. I look back at Lena quickly and reach out to take her elbow. She looks at me and I hope that she understands this.

"Let's go," I say with a tone of impatience. My eyes meet her, and I just want her to know how proud I am, and that she is doing great.

When the door opens it is as if something died and was left there for days. The smell just becomes a whole other force that knocks the wind out of us. I lift my hand up to cover my nose and can see Lena got the brunt of this.

Behind us I can hear Frank saying, "Ward Six has its own special perfume."

Frank goes ahead of us with his flashlight, clicking it on and shining the beam into the cell, one by one. He bangs on the first door and looks back at me.

"This is it, the grand tour," he says pointing at the door. "Here's your boy Thomas, if you want to say hello."

I walk by him, not wanting to stop. Any indication that I know him and we are done.

"So what do you think?" he asks Lena.

"Awful," she says through her hand covered mouth.

"Better to listen and do as you're told. No use ending up like _this _guy," he says to Lena.

I continue walking down the hall and there I see it. The cell that Thomas showed me before. I can see the light shining in the cell. Most of the other ones are dark with no light. There is no light here, which means that the only reason why this one has light, is because she is the one who escaped, and the light is from the outside. The light catches the cross and there it is, the confirmation that I knew it was her. Lena's mother was here, and now has escaped.

I turn around and she looks at me worried.

"What?" she says.

"Don't," I say trying to keep my voice down.

"What is it?" she says again to me.

"That's where she was," Frank says behind her ear as he goes around her and opens up the cell. "Number one-eighteen. Admin hasn't coughed up the dough to get the walls patched, yet, so for now we're just leaving it as is. Not a lot of money around here for improvements…"

It is that very comment that something inside of me begins to burn. It was in one of these cells that these monsters kept him, just like they kept Lena's mother. She shouldn't see this, this is who they are, and this is what the cure does to people who fear love.

I try and stop her, try to tell her that I am sorry, but she just moves around me and continues into the room.

Frank stands next me and I see Lena with her hand cupped over her mouth slowly turning around. Her emotions inside starting to become visible, I know what she must be thinking, what she must be feeling, and the only thing that I can wish is that it never happened in the first place.


	20. Chapter 20

twenty

There is nothing that I could do. I want to take it back, everything. This isn't what I wanted, to see her so distraught there standing in her mother's cell. The way she looked at me, it was worse than that day I told her that I was from the Wilds. It was as if I took the last bit of innocence from her. There was nothing that I could do and the way she looked at me, she knew that to be true. All I could do is move to one side as she ran by me out of the cell. I wanted to hold her, and there behind me was the reason why I couldn't. His stupid smug smile, the way his laughter felt like nails on a chalk board.

"Think she got the message," Frank says nudging me on the shoulder.

"Yeah, thanks," I say. "Got to go get her, don't want her to do something stupid."

I don't even look to see if he acknowledges it, but I run after her. In the hallway, the pale grey hallway, I see her at the end there on her knees clinging onto the door. As I come to her, I slow my pace and there I see the tears and I can hear her saying something over and over.

"Get me out of here," her voice repeats over and over. The door buzzes and she is up and out before I can say anything. Once the door behind Ward Six closed, she finally turns and finds me there. I lean in to her ear, and the only thing I can think of saying is, "thank you for being so strong, it is almost done."

She looks up and I know that she is confused at what I said. It was as if she wanted to hold me there, but know that she couldn't. I guide her through the hallways with a hand on her elbow. It was an understandable reaction, to hold her up, to have my hands on her. The nurses all gave her an approving look, an understandable concession. She feels so heavy in my hand, that I feel if I remove it, she will collapse. Every time we get to a courtyard, I just whisper to her, "almost there, a little bit further."

She nods and finally when we get outside and the Crypts are becoming a memory, she doesn't stop walking, she walks past the bus stop. All I can do is walk on the other side of the street, catching glances of her walking, holding herself from falling apart. She is so strong, walking there after seeing where her mother was. I don't know how far we walk but finally I see her stop and put her hands on her stomach almost collapsing. This is it, I think to myself. I cross over to her side and see a Regulator up ahead. It was the worst possible place to stop. I wait for the Regulator to move his head to the other side and quickly walk next to her.

"Can you move?" I say.

"I think so," she responds.

"Alley, On your left. Go." I say quickly and see her stand up and walk into the alley. It is a semi private location. There behind the garbage bins should provide enough cover to talk and let it all out.

After a couple of seconds I walk into the alley and find her sitting on the other side of the garbage bin looking at the ground. I kneel in front of her and brushing her hair away from her face she looks up at me.

"I'm sorry, Lena," I say. "I thought you'd want to know."

"Twelve years," she says. "I thought she was dead for twelve years."

It is the same thought that I had, but mines was filed with guilt because I miss it. Miss being able to talk to him, it was something that I promised myself I would never do again. There is no thinking, there is no fear, all there is, and all that is left is to react. My hands reach her and all she does is close her eyes. It is the hardest moment that anyone had to go through. The confusion of what to think, or what to believe, it is the image of a safe world that has been shattered and exposed for what it truly is.

"Hey. Look at me," I say to Lena whose eyes are closed.

She looks up at me, and I know that she needs time.

"You must be hungry. Let's get you home okay? Are you okay to walk?"

She looks at me, and then I don't know if she is truly focusing on what I am saying or if she is still lost in her own world. I move back from her looking at her.

"No." she says.

"You're not okay to walk?" I say.

"No…I mean I can't go home at all," she says.

She has to process, in a place that she feels safe. Her home right now is the best place to do that. If she doesn't want to go home, then the only other place that I can think of, where she could feel safe is the Highlands.

"We could go over to Brooks for a while, hang out at the house for a bit. And when you feel better…" I start to say.

"You don't get it," she interrupts. "I want to run away with you. To the Wilds. Like we talked about."

It would be a dream to believe that, but I have learned that actions that are thought through have the tendencies to fail. They are guided by emotions and it is not what she needs, she needs time to process.

"Listen, Lena, it's been a really long day. You're exhausted. You're hungry. You're not thinking clearly…" I say to her hoping that she realizes that this is a big decision, and I know that she will miss her family.

"I _am_ thinking clearly," she says more forcefully as she stands. The anger in her voice is the same anger that I had in my heart. It can consume you if you are not careful, it can cause you to do things that you wish you never did. The smell of smoke still haunts me and the fire that blazes in my nightmares; I can still hear the screams of people that I wish died in that house burning.

"I can't stay here, Alex. Not anymore. Not after – not after that," she says and then pauses. "They knew Alex. They knew and they never told me."

I stand up and know that she cannot just turn her back on all of her family, on Grace, or even on Hana. It is the loneliest existence to in this world, to know that everyone that you love is gone. She doesn't know what she is wishing on herself, I can try and be there for her, but there are some things that I simply cannot be for her.

"You don't know that for sure," I say.

"I _do_ know," she says with certainty. "I can't go home and I won't. I'll go with you. We can make our home in the Wilds. Other people do it, don't they? Other people _have_ done it. My mother…"

Her mother had no choice. Anyone who is in the Crypts will wish for freedom, but when they realize the hardest thing about living in the Wilds, they would wish to go back, even to their cells. I only wish that she was making this decision because she wants to, and not because she feels betrayed. What if, the hurt wears off, and all that is left is me. The memories that she has of her sister and her family, would cause her to want to come back. She doesn't know, she doesn't realize what she is truly asking.

"Lena, if you leave – really leave – it won't be like it is for me now. You get that, right? You won't be able to go back and forth. You won't be able to come back _ever._ Your number will be invalidated. Everyone will know you're a resister. Everyone will be looking for you. If anyone found you – if you were ever caught…"

I can't finish the sentence, I won't. She doesn't realize the cost of this decision. I didn't realize this until I saw the true horror, that Thomas was caught. He will never leave that place, and will more than likely die there. This cannot happen to Lena, it will not happen to her.

"I don't care," she snaps. "You were the one who suggested it, weren't you? So what? Now that I'm ready to go, you take it back?"

"I'm just trying to…" I say trying to get her to understand.

"You're just like everybody else. You're as bad as all the rest of them. Talk, talk, talk – it comes so easily to you. But when it's time to _do_ anything, when it's time to _help_ me…"

She is angry, she wants to yell, she wants to blame someone. I guess this means that she will blame me. Doesn't she see that I am only trying to help her, trying to get her to see the importance of what she is deciding? This isn't something she can just forget and come back from. The worst thing, is the regret of a decision that you made on a whim.

"I'm _trying_ to help you," I say back to her. "It's a big deal. Do you understand that? It's a huge choice, and you're pissed, and you don't know what you're saying."

"Don't treat me like a child," she says with anger in her voice.

"Then stop acting like one," the words come out before I could think, before I can react. It isn't what I meant; it wasn't the way I wanted to tell her. I reach out to try and hold her, but she takes a step back.

"Listen, Lena. I'm really sorry. I know you've had – I mean, with everything that happened today – I can't imagine how you must be feeling."

Her eyes filled with tears, she turns and grips the wall. It was the last thing that I wanted to do, to make her feel like I did that day. That day that I felt alone, and like everyone turned their back on me. I come closer to her and I could hear in her small still voice, the pain in her words.

"If you cared about me, you would take me away," she says. "If you cared about me at all you would go right now."

My hands touch her shoulders.

"I do care about you," I say.

"You don't," she says. "She didn't either. She didn't care at all."

"That's not true," I say.

"Why didn't she come for me, then?" She says and I know that this whole conversation was not towards me, although I was here. This whole conversation was directed towards her mother. Her pain is palpable that I wish I could help her but not as her mother but as me.

"Where is she now? Why didn't she come looking for me?" she asks.

"You know why," I say. "You know what would have happened, if she was caught again – if she was caught with you. It would have meant death for both of you."

"It's not that. She doesn't care, and you don't care. Nobody cares," she says.

"Lena," I say touching her elbow wishing that she would turn to see me. Her eyes look down trying to avoid looking at me. My hand touches her chin and finally her eyes filled with tears connect with mine. In those eyes I find everything that I had longed for, and I know that she doesn't know what it is like to be wanted.

"Magdalena," I say softly. "Your mother loved you. Do you understand that? She loved you. She still loves you. She wanted you to be safe."

Her eyes flicker and I know that she understands me. This is pass the hurt, and pass the abandonment.

"And I love you too," I say softly. "You should know that. You have to know that."

It is then that I realized that by saying those words to her, she doesn't flinch. I don't look around, and I don't pretend that I only said it to say it; I want her to believe me. In this alley, there is no more walls between me and her, it is the only thing that I had held because I knew she would be scared.

"I love you too," she says. The words come off with no hesitation, with no fear. Looking at her now, I see that she means it, that she understands that it isn't a disease but something wonderful, a gift. There is no more fear in her eyes, because of the lie of the cure. She doesn't even look around, but focuses on my eyes. It is as a certainty as her heart beat that no longer beats erratically, but steady.

A tear creeps up on me and all I feel is warmness in my heart, spreading throughout my body. I don't stop the emotion from coming, the happiness that my heart feels. The first time I saw her running in Monument Square I was remembering my father, and the grave that I saw. This time though, she has taken that horrible memory and has made it the happiest one ever. This time the tear rolls to my cheek and her hand moves from her chest and wipes it away. My hand moves to cheek and she closes her eyes and smiles. It is there that we realize that we both love each other. This isn't now about pain, about being abandoned, it was now about us and the way she has allowed herself to love.

"All that I do is because I love you," I say. "Remember that, I don't want to lose you, I wish that I could be with you forever. I think I would be the happiest then."

"We could be happy then," she says. "There is no one but us in the Wilds."

"You do realize all that you would be giving up?" I say. "All the places here in Portland, Lena, you could no longer go to. We could never go back to East End Beach, 37 Brooks or to Back Cove, the runs that you would do, or even Monument Square, those places would be like a dream that you could never come back to. That of course isn't the hardest part. You couldn't tell anyone, you couldn't tell Hana that you were leaving. Lena, it would be too dangerous for her, if she knew, too dangerous for us. You would have to live with the fact that she would never know truly what happened to you. You would have to leave them all behind."

"Would I have you?" she says.

I nod.

"Then it is all I need," she says.

"If we go together, it's just you and me," I say again. "No going back. Ever."

"That's all I want. Just you and me. Always."

I kiss her and she finally becomes mine. My heart becomes hers and I can feel her heart becoming mine. The dream of her finally comes true.

"Okay," I say. "We will go."

"Really?" she says with a smile.

"Yes," I say.

"When? Now?" she says.

"Next Friday, we have to plan it, have to get everything ready," I say.

"Why not now?" she says. "Alex I don't know how I can go back there."

"Lena," I say. "I don't want to happen what happened to my parents. We have to plan for it. Patience is important because now that this thing that happened, an escape from the Crypts, there are bound to have more guards on the borders, looking for your mother. We have to wait for it to die down. I have to get everything ready on the other side."

"You are going to cross?" she asks.

"It's necessary," I say. "Winter is coming and we need to get as much heavy clothes as we can over there. Plus the food and supplies that we need to take, I can't get out when we leave. Once the snow starts we would have to bunker down, since we wouldn't be able to come back, all the medical supplies and food I would need to take. We cannot live on fried skunk all the time."

She wrinkles her nose and I just let out a laugh.

"Plus I want you to bring me everything that you would want over there," I say. "Pictures, clothes, food that you can get out of the store, so that I can start moving it over to the other side. We can continue to plan it tonight at Brooks."

"Midnight," she asks.

I nod. She walks down the block with me now, in front and I am behind. I start to whistle a happy little tune to let her know how happy I am with her. It was our sign, to tell her that how much I cared about her. As we get close to her street she slows down and I know that she is still thinking about the lies and the hurt from her family. She turns around and I mouth the words, seven days. She turns to Cumberland and then turns around to see me. She smiles and I smile back. Couple of hours and then we will be together, planning our lives together. It seems as if the days cannot go by any faster, and yet there is so much that I have to do.

It takes me only about twenty minutes to get to Gabriel's and Beatrice's house. It is Friday so I know that Gabriel is still on his shift over at the Bus transportation hub. It would be easier to talk to Beatrice, she was always the one who understood, Gabriel was always the one to act. The house's shades are drawn and as I approached it, I could feel the day slowly turning from cool to cold.

The knock on the door, I wait there a couple of minutes. It is those minutes that I start to think to myself. How do I tell her that after we do this, she will be in danger? She opens the door and inside I do what I always do, deflect.

"Alex, come inside," she says seriously and I know that something is wrong.

Once inside she doesn't say anything but puts her hand on her mouth as a symbol that we are not safe. So we walk downstairs, and then finally through the heavy door. Once on the other side, she turns around and gives me an embrace. It wasn't a normal embrace though; it is something of a desperation.

"I thought it was you," she says.

"What are you talking about?" I say.

"We have heard reports, none confirmed though, of a guard being discovered," she says. She crosses her arms and then walks away from me. She had always been there to take care of me, and I know that it must have been hard for her to keep herself from finding out. This information of course would put her in danger; put everyone she knows in danger.

"It was Thomas," I say.

"How did you know?" she says.

"I confirmed it, I saw him there..." I start to say before I stop. The images too hard to accept, the fact that he is there, seeing him there hanging from the ceiling. It was the quick image that I saw him as I walked by his cell.

She comes to me and just as I am about to embrace her, she reaches out and slaps me across my face.

"Do you have any idea how stupid that was," she yells. "You could have been caught. Then where will I be?"

She didn't say, "we" like she had before. This wasn't about the rebellion, it was about me. The things you learn about people when there is the possibility of being caught. In front of me is a woman who gave her life to help a cause that she believes in. Every day is the possibility of being caught, and then the penalty is all too real. There was no prize for harboring a Invalid, just death. She had told me once, that the reason why they joined was simply because she had lost her newly born child. She couldn't understand how love could be wrong when she felt such a strong connection to her child years after she had the procedure done. It was the same for Gabriel. Having the child that he was given permission to have by the state of Portland was one thing, but to have the same child die and the pain become real was something that he couldn't understand.

They both hid these feelings of love and lost from each other, and when it finally came out, they knew that they had to do something. I was their first child from the Wild and I guess they were truly my first parents.

"I care you about you too," I say. "I didn't even know that there was an incident. I walked right into it. Do we know what happened?"

She nods no.

"Only thing we know is that a guard orchestrated an escape of a high level prisoner. It was foolish, and short sighted, and well impulsive, so naturally, everyone thought…"

"That it was me?" I say finishing the sentence. "Well give me some credit. I would come and tell you if I was about to do anything foolish."

She stops and then looks at me.

"Why…are you here?" She says.

"To tell you…" I hesitate and then finally taking a deep breath finish what I was going to say. "That I am about to do something foolish."

"Is it about her?" She asks with a softness in her voice that I am unable to quite read. I could never really quite read her; she was after all the master at the poker face. Is she angry? Disappointed? Fearful?

I nod and finally she smiles.

"Don't worry about us," she says. "The Story of Solomon."

It was her way of saying that she only wants for me to be happy even if it is a cost for her. This of course is not shared by everyone in the rebellion. This would be considered to be selfish; we are after all in a war. They wouldn't see the number of years that I spent getting information, getting those samples, happiness in war is never something real, it is always a fairy tale.

I embrace her, and she pats me on the back. What she thought was the only thing that mattered.

"When?" she asks but then stops herself. "Don't safer for you and for us if we don't know.

Her expression is one of longing, and sadness. I know that out of all the people that were here in Portland, she would be the one I would miss the most. After a couple of seconds we go back upstairs and then we eat dinner and wait for Gabriel to come home.

"You leave the talking to me," Beatrice says. "You know how protective Gabe is."

I nod, and as she opens the door, he smiles and gives me an embrace. We exchange pleasantries and then we walk downstairs in our safe area. He gets some chairs and we sit down.

"I knew it couldn't have been you," he says smiling. "We heard whispers and well you know how Bea gets. She was worried out of her mind. I kept telling her, that Alex will be okay. That we trained you better."

"Do you know what happened?" I ask.

"Some idiot went rouge and decided to play superhero," he says. He always told me to keep my head down, and do what I am told. To trust that other people have an idea of what they are doing, even when we cannot see it ourselves. He grabs a bottle of whiskey that he has hidden only for special occasions. Beatrice of course never approves of his drinking, but it is the only way he can coupe. He always does the same thing, pours a cup and then salutes to his son. This time he pours two glasses and tells me to grab one. Clinking the glass together he smiles and drinks his glass. "The other leaders are trying to assess how much damage this is going to cause. There is no way to know who it was. Mind you we are still trying to get everyone to check in. The patrols have doubled; the Crypts are on lock down."

"You're telling me, the strip search was not a welcomed sight," I say and just as the words are coming out, I try and hold them back. Looking down at the small wooden table, I see his glass come down on the table.

"How do you know that?" he says almost as if he knows what the answer is going to be.

"I did a little recon," I say looking up at him. His face goes from relax to tense in a second. His eyes narrow and finally after gulping down the last part of the whiskey from his glass, his eyes finally lock on mine.

"What did you do?" he says his voice tenses.

"I didn't know about the incident, but when I went to find Thomas, I confirmed that it was him," I say.

"Shit," he says as he spits on the ground. "Thomas? He was our in with Ward Six. Now, what the hell were you doing there?"

"Gabe he didn't know," I say. "If he had known, you think he would have been there?"

"Bea, you know what this means right?" He says looking at him. "If anyone has half a brain they will put two and two together. I bet he went there looking for Thomas by name. They will make a connection sooner or later," Gabe says raising his voice.

"Come on, Alex," he says looking at me. "You _know_ better than this."

I am about to tell him everything when Beatrice gets in between us. "He came here, because of _your_ training, to warn us. He wanted to let us know he was alright so that we wouldn't worry. To tell you what he must do."

He pauses and then looks at me.

"What do you have to do?" he says putting his hand on Bea's arm. His eyes wander from mines to her, and then finally it is like the silence has a voice of its own.

"It's the only way," I say. "I can't think of any of way."

He walks around me and then up the stairs. He doesn't say anything for the rest of the night. All Beatrice could do is tell me that he needs time to process. That she will get him to see reason and that he is only made because he is going to miss you. I look outside and see that the sun is beginning to set, and that it is almost time to get the first pack ready. I stand from the dinner table and say my goodbyes. Gabe just turns around and goes into his room, silent.

"Tell him, that I will miss him?" I say to Beatrice.

She nods. This is our goodbyes. Once outside I see the stars are coming and this maybe the last time that I see her. I stand there looking at Beatrice. We embrace for one last time, and then as she is near my ear, she tells me that she finally understands fully the story of Solomon and how it was possible to give up her child so that they will be safe.

She turns around and closes the door behind her. The lock slide in behind it and that is it. I place my hand on the door and close my eyes and say my last goodbye.

The walk through the streets of Portland is quiet and still. The shadows of the street lights are darker than usual without the moonlight over head. It is dangerous to be out especially this close to the whole incident. Looking at my watch, I know that I have only a couple of hours before I have to make my way to 37 Brooks. The first thing that I have to get over is medical supplies and winter clothing.

I am walking through the night streets of the Highlands. It looks different though, and I can't put my finger on it, but something seems off. I hear a crack of a branch, and there, in the shadows, I think….I think I see movement.

"Alex!" she says out loud and starts to run towards me. I turn and look at her, running down the street. I see then a cat dart in front of me and finally breath as it was just my imagination. Her arms wrap around mines and it is so forceful that I am almost knocked down, the air temporarily out of my lungs.

"Shhh," I say looking down at her. Her smile catches mines and all I can do is kiss the tip of her nose. "We're not safe yet."

"Yeah, but soon," she says as she kisses me. It takes me a moment to remember where we are after that kiss. I smile and she has to nudge me in order for me to focus.

"Thanks for giving me a key, by the way," she says.

That is odd what is she talking about.

"A key?" I ask.

"For the lock," she says. It is then that I think of the signs, the odd feeling, the moving shadows. It is a trap.

"Freeze! Both of you! Hands on your head!"


	21. Chapter 21

twenty one

I don't know how it happens. It is as if everything goes black then white, and then suddenly quiet. Everything slows down and all I see now is her. Whether or not it is just pure adrenaline, I don't know, but it is as if electricity comes from somewhere and all my focus is on making sure she is safe.

"Go, Lena, go!" I shout at her, but she stands still. I turn and see a guard lifting something, so I do not what I am told, not what I am trained, I do what comes as a reflex, and it surprises me that I am even doing this. I start to run towards the guard that is more than likely lifting a gun to point. Give her as much time as possible to get away that is the plan. My elbow connects with the guard and I hear the clunk of the gun. There is a hand on my shoulder and another one on my backpack. Turning around I hit the first person I see. The grunt of the guard is enough for his grip on my shoulder to slip.

A quick look back and I see Lena running. My thoughts and my prayers are only on if I am able to get everyone to follow me. I see the nearby gun, and pick it up running towards the abandoned houses. I point the gun up to the air and start to fire, round after round after round. The chatter comes from all around, and all I can think of is the cellar.

It was a clumsy move, and well the high grass was definitely the cause for it, but falling over the handle was just a bit of luck. At the time my shins never thought it was good luck, but now that I am running to find a hiding space this is good luck.

'Wynnewood'

I run through the yard and hop over the nearby fence. All I feel is my body moving, the pressure in my bones. I feel the fire in my lungs as I run; it is a painful feeling that radiates through my body and distracting at the same time. The next street I see are the old oak trees that lines the front yards of the homes. The high grass from the lack of care and maintenance is a welcomes sight. It is finally Wynnewood, where some of the homes do not have basements but have raised foundations. The one with the rope on the branch is the signal of the hiding place that I had made. I can hear the sirens and I can hear the radios, but I do not see the regulators.

'Did I give her enough time, was it enough?'

I see the lights from flashlights dancing through the night. I have probably two to three minutes before they come over. I stop in the center of the street and looking around me, quickly. The options run through my head.

Where is it? Where is it? I look around trying to find the old porch. It was the house that had the hiding place underneath. I dig into the asphalt and propel myself to the backside of the home. I kick the bottom panels until one finally pops out. I look around the corner and see the guards.

"Where did he go?" One of them says.

"Fan out, check each house, he couldn't have gotten far," another says.

I come back to the hole throwing the backpack in first and then work my way into it. It is a small hole that can barely fit me but some way somehow I am able to squeeze in, and grab the panel popping it back into place. I hear the footsteps coming and hold my breath.

The boots walk along the side of the home. I can hear the radio cut in through the quiet night.

"First contact has been secured, anyone have a sighting on the second one?"

"There is Johnson," the person whose boots it belong to. "No contact."

First one? The implications, the failure, she didn't get away. The broken glass cuts in my shins, and my body is frozen there in fear of what is happening to Lena. I hear the Johnson go to the back door and open it. I come out of the hole, and then follow inside the house. This one is by himself, and is my only way out of this.

I hear him walking through the hallways. The creaking of the wood below his steps is a dead giveaway, not to mention the flashlight that is still on. I wonder sometimes why after all this training the rebellion make us take, why we haven't acted against these people. The pain rips through my inside, and all I feel is anger. The steps that he makes echoes and all I see is the beating of old house they raided. Is that what they did? Did they hit her? Unzipping my backpack, I feel for my guard flashlight which is a heavy and can act as a weapon. He deserves what's coming to him, for all the pain and misery. He deserves it for taking away my father, letting me an orphan after my mother died. These are the same people who took Lena's mother and kept her in that hell hole for all those years, kept her in the darkness, like an animal. No one will miss this one, no one will cry over him. I creep up behind Johnson and then when he turns towards the nearby room, I swing the hardest I can and the loud thud confirms the connection.

His body crumples to the ground and immediately the flashlight slips from my hand and lands on the ground.

'What did I do?'

The fire that burns inside without any control has now spilled over and I couldn't control it. The fear that runs through my body chills my blood, because it isn't that I couldn't control it, it is that I didn't want to. I listen to hear if anyone is in the house is coming to check on the noise. The steps backwards lead me to the wall on the opposite side.

'This isn't me; this isn't what they would want for me.'

After a couple of seconds of silence I stand over Johnson, his body there on the ground. I don't think that I hit him that hard, I don't think I hope I didn't. I freeze there over his body and hope and pray that I see some movement, a twitch of a finger, a groan from his throat, anything.

'I have to know.'

I lean in and check his pulse. The faint pulse through my finger tips and I let out a deep sigh of relief.

'Good, he isn't dead, but he is going have a huge headache when he wakes up.'

I take off my jacket and then remove his shirt and pants and helmet. I quickly put them on, put on his ID and then grab his walkie. The helmet will definitely hide my face and the uniform is the same as the one who is chasing me, it will help me just blend in. I stash the backpack in a closet and then I walk out to the yard, turning on my flashlight. I move through the nearby street and then through another yard to the adjoining street.

"Hey," I hear from behind.

I turn and had the good luck of clipping my ID badge in a way that Johnson's face was obscured.

"Yeah?" I say back.

"Did you find anything?" he asks.

"No," I say. "How about you?"

He nods no. "We got one though," he says turning and going into the next house. I make it as if I am going to the one on the other side of the street and then finally disappear in the nearby abandoned buildings.

I toss the helmet in the garbage bin and go behind the buildings to the alley way where I see the back of a clothing store. I kick in the door and then close it behind me. The good things about the stores this close to the Highlands are that they do not have alarm systems. It was where a couple of hours ago, I had go in and bought Lena those winter gloves, that now seem pointless. I grab a couple of shirts and a jean, removing the guard's uniform not wanting to be reminded on what I just did. The dark aisles are quiet and feel like what the Wilds looked like before they were the Wilds.

The hours pass slowly and then quickly, it is like I am in limbo. My thoughts go from missing Lena, to thinking about where she would be.

'If they know about me, that I was from the Wilds, then she would be in the Crypts and all is lost. I wouldn't be able to go in and get her.'

The emotion comes through the dressing room of the clothing store. I put my palms on my eyes to stop the rush of emotions.

'If they don't know that I am from the Wild, then they would take Lena…'

The next hours were as torturous as the thoughts in my head. Trying to figure how to save her, how to get to safety, it ate at me, the pain not a fast sharp pain, but a dull prolonged pain that radiated and took away everything about me. I don't even know how long I was there, but when I started to see the dark sky turn a greyish color, I knew that the sun was beginning to rise. The pain is a welcome feeling, as it means that I am still alive, and still haven't given up. I stand up and look at myself in the mirror.

I take the guard's clothes which more than likely has either woke up or waking up right now. The last thing I need though is to be caught with these. As I walk outside, I see a metal drum and throw the clothes in there. Lighting a match I let it fall in the drum and let it consume the shirt and pants, let it consume the memory of it.

There is nowhere to go, nowhere safe. My pass by the apartment near the University and I find hardly anyone there on a Saturday morning. I walk slowly by the apartment and do not see any evidence of a sting. There isn't any danger if they do not know who I was. Something inside me, though, doesn't feel right, so I continue walking and then turn to Monument Square. The Grind is there and I can see people coming in and out. I walk in and see Peter behind the counter.

"Hey Warren," he says lifting up his hand in a wave. "Long time."

"Yeah," I say. "Too long, what have you been up to?"

He lifts up the cups of coffee and hands them to the two girls that are currently waiting for them. There are the summer kids that are just starting the University of Portland. All these kids who do not know what they are in store for. They believe that this system that they put all of their trust in. Everything from where you will live, to what you will study, to how much money you will make, to how many kids will you have. I think of this, our lives, this whole thing, truly a shadow of its reality, together not because of love, but because of convenience. I look around and think to myself that this is the best place to rest.

Peter leans in, "hey you okay? It seems like you are a little run down."

"These overnight shifts at the labs are going to be the death of me," I say.

"I can only imagine," he says. "You know you could always come back. No overnights. Take the backroom though, you look like shit."

It seems like an innocent thing and no one would be able to find me here. I do feel as if I haven't slept in…how many days has it been? I think about it as I walk to the backroom that we use as storage. The small hallway, brings back flashes of everything, I could hear Lena screaming. My heart begins to beat faster and a couple of the girls coming from the bathroom with a concern look. The hallway starts to move and I have to put up my hand on the wall to steady myself. My hand moves to the door knob and then finally as I open the door and close it behind I slump down to the floor.

'She is gone. I will never see her again.'

The nightmares come fast and last long. As hard as I try to fight my way through a sea of regulators, she just keeps drifting away. The screams from her to help her, to save her, to take her away from this place is a pain that rings through the endless darkness, the shadows that shallow me whole. Everything begins to shake, my focus comes in and out, and the ground opens up.

"Alex," I hear someone yelling my name. "Yo, wake up man!"

Finally I am up and looking around. Trying to catch my breath I see Drew standing in front of me. His hands are on my shoulders.

"You alright man?" he says. "You were yelling, almost got the whole police force down here and believe you me; you do not want that sort of heat right now."

I can feel my shirt soaked with sweat and the first thing I think of, is the time.

"What time is it?" I ask.

"A little bit after five," he says looking around, nervous, rattled. "You know the shit that is happening outside?"

"About Thomas in the Crypts?" I say.

"Well there is that," he says. "Just yesterday man, there was some shit that went down in the Highlands. Everything is sketchy right now, but they are looking for someone who beat up some cop in a raid." He stops talking and looks at me, and then it is as if a light bulb just turned on his mouth opens.

"I barely touched the guy," I say in defense. "They should really teach them a little bit about hand to hand. Or at least not make them out of glass."

He stands up and then goes to the door.

"Everybody on pin and needles man," he says looking down the hallway.

"I was about to cross when they caught us," I say.

"Wait, what?" he says turning around to face me. "Us? You going rouge?"

He doesn't expect an answer because he is out in the hallway before I can even come up with something. It was something that we had always talked about, the two of us. No one ever thought though that we would, it was always just us talking out loud. He had been inside longer than I have, ever since he was eight. His parents killed by Scavengers just outside of Boston. He has been inside almost fifteen years, and he never really talked about leaving, whereas I always talked about the outside.

The way he sits down and just stares out to monument square, I know that he never thought that I would try. It was going to happen soon, even if I had never met Lena. Meeting Lena just made the dream a reality.

I sit down next to him.

"Never thought," he says.

"It was important," I say. "I had to."

He nods silently, before he stands up without saying anything. He walks to the door and then looks towards the Square. I turn to see what caught his attention and then that is where I see her. The gold hair in a ponytail stopping at the Governor, even from this distance I know who it is. I am out of my chair when I see her look from side to side and then jump up placing something in the hand of the Governor.

'A note.'

She kneels and makes like she is tying her shoes before taking off again. I look around and see that no one but Drew had seen Hana place something in the hand of the Governor. He looks at me, and then tells me 'clean.' He had made a sweep and had found no Regulators or Police in the area. The same place that I had first seen her, running and yelling and smiling, is the last place that I may know what happened to Lena.

I reach up into the empty hand as Drew looks around making sure that no one is looking at us. The little square paper fits in my palm.

'Lena house, cure 2morrow, 2night last chance.'

I look at Drew and he takes the paper from my hand and reads it for himself. Everything changes at that moment, the mission has been made, and all I can think of is the task at hand.

"Come on," he says tapping me on the arm.

We walk through a little part of Portland that house the orphanages and family homes. It is where children of diseased parent go after they die. Most of the poor people of Portland live around this area, these grey houses, drained of any color, any sort of life, ghosts.

We walk for what seems like forever before we reach an old warehouse district. The sun has begun to set and I know that tomorrow early morning they will take her to the labs under a police escort. The only time that is the most opportune for an escape is the night before. Curfew is coming and I know that only have a couple of hours left to do anything, if I am going to do anything at all.

Drew finally opens an old storage locker. This is surprising; I thought I was the only one who had secret areas that the rebellion didn't know about. He looks back at me and smile.

"Don't think you are the only one with secrets," he says coming over to something in the center of the room. It has a dark tarp over it with chains protecting it. He digs into his pocket and then finally comes up with some keys in his hands. Finding the lock he unlocks it and removes the chain. Picking up one end of the tarp he looks up at me and then removing the tarp. A black motorcycle stands before me, on the rarest things I had ever seen. I mean I have never seen one, and have only heard of them in stories of the time before the cure. The way the engine would roar and slip between cars, almost as if it was made for the shadows.

Drew runs his hand over the bike softly almost as if it made of something so fragile that it could break if looked the wrong way.

"Took me five years," he says looking at it. "The paint, is the original midnight black, everything…everything on this bike is original, and fine-tuned for high performance. Do you know how hard it is to find parts for a 2013 Ducati 1200 Multistrada? Not to mention how difficult it was to get the tires."

"Forget all that," I say. "Where did you get the fuel for it? Does it even run?"

He turns and takes out the key, letting it dangle from his fingertips.

"To answer your first question," he says cupping his mouth and breathing into it. "Acquired it from umm… other sources. Remind me to get a mint."

"To answer your second question," he says putting in the key into what seems is the ignition, he turns the key and it only takes one or two seconds for it to turn over. The engine roars to life as he revs the throttle.

I look around panicked before he lets out a laugh and turns off the engine.

"You should have seen your face," he says laughing. "Think you might want to check your pants."

He walks over to me smiling with his arms opened. We share an embrace and then finally he shakes my hand, inside the feel of a key in our palm. I open my hand and see the key to the motorcycle. I look up at him and he just gives me a shrug.

"You need it more than I do," he says. "Go save her."

"I can't," I say. "This took you forever. This is your way out."

He lets out a laugh and then remove something from his eyes.

"You really think that I would leave," he says shaking his head. "You were always the stronger one of us. I am truly going to miss you man."

I look down at it; he must have been saving this one for when he would escape. He always said he would go in a blaze of glory, like a lightning bolt, here today, gone tomorrow, never hitting the same place. It was the way he came up with his name, Bolt.

"I don't know what to say," I say.

"Don't say anything… but do me a favor?" he says.

"Anything," I say.

"Live man… live free, and really open her up for me, really let it fly," he says. "Always wanted to feel the wind in my hair going fast on this motorcycle."

"Will do," I say.

He walks next to me tapping me on the shoulder. "Get going, the night isn't getting any younger."

He is out in the alley way, before I call out to him.

"Hey Bolt," I say out loud.

He turns around, lifting up his hands as to say 'what.'

"You really do need a mint," I say putting up my hand waving my goodbye. It would be our last stand, our escape, and looking at the motorcycle, he had given me our one true shot at making it.


	22. Chapter 22

twenty two

There is a hill in Stroudwater that it is illegal to ride any bicycles on. At first I had always thought it was sort of weird to make it illegal to use the only transportation we had in Portland. It takes forever to get there but one summer, we went to Oakdale, and it was as if we were looking at mountain. The incline of that hill made it hard to walk up, let alone bike up.

'Race you to the top,' Drew says.

'Go ahead and run up, you won't get twenty feet before you have to stop,' I said to him.

He tried anyways and of course he lasted about thirty feet before he had to stop. We had of course brought our bikes and figured that anything that was illegal we wanted to do. We didn't really know or really cared about the rebellion, all that we knew was that if it was illegal by the city of Portland, just like love, then it was the exact opposite.

My hand moves over the black plastic and it is smooth to the touch. You can tell that Drew not only rebuilt this motorcycle but he took care of it. It was just like his red bicycle, that day, it was windy and when we were at the very top of the hill, you could see almost the entire city of Portland.

"Whatever you do," he says with a smile. "Don't look down."

This of course always had the exact opposite effect and my head lowered to find that the way down is a long way down. I had never seen Portland in this way though. Almost as if you would think that the entire world lived inside the walls.

"You know what they call this particular hill?" he says pausing to look at my reaction. The way he looks out towards the view, I know that this isn't the usual Drew with his jokes. Something about the tone of his words it is as if this was the first time that I had heard him this serious.

"They call it Suicide Point," he says.

Looking at him for a second, I can tell that he is serious. It was only a second because he lets out a loud howl trying to let everyone down there know that we are coming.

"You know what would be awesome?" He asks. "If we had motorcycles instead of bicycles. Can you imagine going down this hill on motorcycles going as fast as possible?"

"Yeah, and dying when we lose control?" I say.

"It is all about the shifting," he says. "That is the key."

I look at his feet and he shows me about shifting in a motorcycle even though back then we never used it and to this day never really knew how he knew it in the first place. The key in my hand, the night sky before me, and I knew now that everything that I learned, and everyone that I knew all was for this moment. The engine roars to life and straddling the motorcycle, I place my foot on petal and remember up to shift up and down to shift down, left hand on the brake and right on the clutch. I click up the shift and know that I am on first gear.

It does take me a couple of minutes to get it, but once I do, it is amazing. The old Airport is all abandoned and so the ride in the dark is like riding through the shadows. The moon light its own headlight, giving me enough light to see objects but not the details. The open tarmac gives me enough time to learn how to quickly shift gears and then onto Congress Street. I look down at my watch and notice the time. It is almost twelve thirty and at the speed that I am going, I will be passing Forrest Avenue in only fifteen minutes. The streets are empty and hardly any regulators on the street. If they can hear me and more than likely they can, they do not have a vehicle fast enough to catch this motorcycle. There isn't anyone walking on the streets, as I pass Deering Avenue. I press the brake and then come in front of Congress and High Street, in front of the Museum.

If I go around Congress Street and come down on Cumberland from the North, I can probably go out through the old Airport. There isn't that much security at the entry point there. This is where the trucks come on from the Government Highway that connects with Boston and New York. If we can make it there, to the open highway, we can punch the bike until we are halfway south to New York and then ditch it somewhere. The streets are blurred and I only focus on the landmarks, the nearby church, and finally the corner store.

I make a quick left onto Preble and then another one on Cumberland. The seconds pass and it seems as if everything is coming together. Was it like this for all the people who tried to fight for love? It is as if the thought of Lena's words coming back to me gives me strength, calms my nerves.

'I love you too.'

It is as her touch can cause me to have invincibility armor. It is destiny, if ever there was something like that. In every epic love story that I have read, it had always been a struggle, it had always been a fight. Love is not true love unless it cost something, this is my idea, and this is my statement.

I do not know how I make it before anyone can even come out to see. The whole house is dark and it reminds me of that night after the party at Roaring Brook Farms. The first time I felt like I could fly, just like she could, the way she looked at me when she went turned around as she closed the door. The time she told me about the how they pushed their beds into one large bed where they all slept together. I know she probably didn't think that I was paying this close of attention to what she said, but she told me about the stars from her window how she could see Back Cove. I go in between the homes in the little side yard and I look up to the top two windows and both are dark.

Turning off the motorcycle, I suddenly hear the static of walkies from the regulators. I turn around and know that we only have a couple of seconds before all hell breaks loose.

I hear her voice.

"Alex!"

I turn and see her there in the window with a smile that can causes my heart to leap. I open my arms and it is as if we are in one of those fairy tales, the love of my life trapped in a tower.

She looks back into the house and then starts to frantically push against the screen. Someone is coming from inside the house. It has to be the regulators. There is a fear that climbs inside of me, the thought of that regulator with a gun. They will not hesitate to fire if they feel the need to. I turn the bike back on, and know that we do not have time.

"Use your legs," I yell out. She looks back into the room and then a couple of seconds past and I look back into the street and can hear the static coming in closer. They must have called back into the police station. They are coming. If we are still here, we will not have anywhere to go. We have to go, and we have to go now.

The sound of the screen falling on the grass turns my gaze back up and I see Lena hanging from her window. I click the bike into gear and start to move to catch her, but she lets go a second too early and falls hard to the ground. The lights come on in the house, and they are coming back downstairs. I reach out my hand to her.

"Lena!" I yell at her extending my hand. She looks up and reaches for mine. With all of my strength I pull her up and find that something has caught onto her shirt. I turn around and see the Regulator on the porch moving his head around the corner. The street light catches a glimpse of a gun, and I yell to myself as I pull on Lena onto the bike.

"Come on!" I yell back to her. She finally climbs onto the back and I feel her hands wrap around my waist. My hand is reaching for the clutch when I hear the first bullet hit the metal pole behind us.

"Go!" she screams, and clicking pedal up, I twist violently the throttle and the bike jerks quickly into motion. The roar of the engine is deafening and as soon as I am on the street I turn hard to the right back on Cumberland. The bike tips to make the hard turn and as I let go of the brake it rights itself back up. The pop pop pop of the gun shots ring behind us, and I turn into the shadows of the sidewalk to cover our place.

'Gotta go faster. Have to make it.'

Her hands tighten around my waist was we pass State and almost to Deering where I see the police lights coming towards us, filling the entire street. It makes no sense to send everyone to catch someone infect with Deliria. The only thing that would make sense is that police officer that I hit. It would be the only reason why they would pull a gun. They are not after her, they are after me. It finally happened that my anger has put someone that I care about in danger. I have to put space in between the police and us, it is the only way. I would have to give them what they want. I ease up on the throttle and I am about to tell Lena to get off, when two cars cut in from the right on Walker.

"Freeze! Freeze! Freeze or we shoot!"

"Hold on," I yell as I turn left into the alley of two buildings. The pop, pop, pop ring out, and if I can keep moving they cannot hurt her, that is my only concern. The turn is too tight and I can hear the crack in my right knee as we slam into the brick wall. The pain that comes from foot as I try to shift causes my vision to blur for a second before I put all of my energy into not passing out.

The sirens blaring from the left, and as I exit the alley, I turn right onto Brackett and then in between a cover walkway that is meant for pedestrians. The crash that I hear from behind me leads me to smile a little as the turn back to see the two cop cars trying to fit into the narrow space.

Turn right onto state then it hits me, the best place to leave her. The only place I know that she will be safe. Instead of turn left onto Forest I gun it and get onto Marginal Way. The beach at East End is the only place I know that she can hide and I can lead them away.

We are passing Franklin when suddenly a spot light comes on from above and circles around to face us. The voice booms from the helicopter, "I order you, in the name of the government of the United States of America, to freeze and surrender!"

I cover my eyes with the left hand and turning my head to my right I see cars coming from the dark along the road to East End Beach. The waves of the ocean I can barely hear them. I can still hear the children playing that day, and the seagulls crying out in the distance. Taking a deep breath, her voice comes to me in my mind.

'My sister used to stay on the shore and build sand castles, and we would pretend that they were real cities, like we'd swum all the way to the other side of the world, to uncured places….'

My right hand trembles as I feel her arms around me. Her innocence was something that I had fallen in love with that day. Her dream of one day being able to live in these cities brings a well of emotions in my body. The only place that she will be safe is in those sand castles. Sadness comes over me, because I know what I have to do and that I will not be able to see those sand castles with her. I click the gear and turn the throttle as hard as I can. The tires kick up so much mud that the burnt rubber smell smoke comes to us.

The sheds are almost within sight and I know that if I can get over Tukey's Bridge that I can get her across. The bike zooms towards the helicopter which starts to climb up and to our left, positioning itself to do what I know that they will do. The dirt pops up and I know that they are shooting at us. I feel her face on my back and lean down trying to become one with the bike.

"Freeze, dismount, and put your hands on your head!"

I pass the helicopter and then that is where I see it, on the other side of Tukey's Bridge. It is as if the entire police force is on the other side of the bridge blocking us from getting towards the fence. My left hand squeezes the brake and we come to a stop on the bridge. It is no use, if we make it through the bridge the cops will shoot at us.

I lift up my hands and climb off the motorcycle.

"What are you doing!" she screams at me. "We can still make it!"

As long as I am with her, she is in danger. They are after me, they are not after her. If I surrender then she might be able to make it. She might be able to realize that dream of the sand castle, even if I am not there.

"Listen to me," I say close to her ear. "When I tell you to go, you're going to go. You've got to drive this thing, okay?"

She turns and looks at me, her eyes fixed on mines. The tears on my eyes, causes her eyes to being to tear.

"What?" I can't…" she starts.

"Citizen 914-238-6196-3216. Dismount and put your hands above your head. If you do not dismount immediately, we will be forced to shoot."

I look over to the line of police cars to the fence behind them. The red light suddenly comes on, and I know that the fence is turned on. Even if she makes it through the line of the police and by some miracle she doesn't get shot, she will not make it over the fence if it is electrified.

"Lena." I say. "They've electrified the fence. It's powered on."

"How do you know?" she says not breaking her eyes from mines.

"Just _listen_ to me," I say trying to show her that I am serious. "When I say go, you drive. And when I say jump, you jump. You'll be able to get over the fence, but you'll have thirty seconds before the power comes back online, a minute tops. You have to climb as fast as you can. And then you run, okay?"

She reaches and grabs my hand. "Me? What about you?"

My eyes blink rapidly and I try to keep my voice at the same level so she doesn't know that I am lying.

"I'll be right behind you," I say.

"We're giving you ten seconds…nine…eight…"

"Alex…" she cries out to me, obviously scared.

I smile at her. "I promise I'll be right behind you…" I fight a tear that wants to fall. It is the only time that I won't be able to keep this promise to her. Her face seeking for assurance that the sand castle exist that her dream exists.

"…they weren't diseased at all, or destroyed, or horrible. They were beautiful and peaceful, and built of glass and light and things."

My voice catches a little and I have to strain it to get the words out.

"But you have to swear you won't look back. Not even for a second. Okay?"

They were probably the same words that my father told my mother that night. I finally understand him, and in this moment I know that what I am doing is the right thing. I finally come to realize all those stories about love, and what they meant about the greatest love of all, and I am not scared, the fear suddenly just disappears and all I feel is calm and peace.

"Six…five…"

"Alex, I can't…"

"Swear, Lena."

"Three…two…"

"Okay," she says with tears in her eyes. "I swear."

"One,"

The pop from the gun comes and I yell at her. "Go!"

She turns the throttle and I grab onto her waist as the bike jerks forward. The cracks of my shoulder, the immediate pain that races through it, and I know that I pulled my shoulder. They start to fire, and we keep ourselves low to the bike. The bullets fly by us, and I feel something bite me on chest, a warm feeling.

They scatter as we crash through the barriers and then I see the fence with the red light on in the distance. The only way to cut the power is to overload it. We have to be close, we have to be going with enough force to get it to disconnect. It climbs towards us and we are probably ten feet before I lean in to whisper.

"Jump. Now. With me." I say leaning to one side causing the bike to fall and skid in front of us. My body is numb as it hits the ground and I see the rocks flying all around us. I grab her shirt to stop her from crashing into the fence. The bike travels with such a force that when it crashes into it, the blue and white sparks fly from the fence.

Then it becomes all silent. I see Lena get onto her feet and I follow her onto the fence. Placing her hands on the fence she starts to climb quickly and as she is about to get to the top she starts to turn around when I yell out to her, "Go, Lena! Go!"

She is up and over to the other side and is almost at the trees when she does exactly what I wish she wouldn't have. She turns around and looks at me. My hands are still on the fence red with blood, the pain in my chest from the bullet that is now inside of me. The white beam of light on me from the helicopter focused on me and not on her. She is finally safe.

Her eyes burn through my soul and the only thing that I wish I could say is to tell her how much I love her, to tell her that I did all of this for her.

'How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.

I love thee to the depths and breadth and height

My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight…'

The yelling of the police comes closer and closer and all I hear is the beating of my own heart.

'…I love thee with a love I seemed to lose

With my lost saints,…I love thee with the breath,

Smiles, tears, of all my life!...and, if God choose…

I yell at her. "Run!"

"I shall but love thee Magdalena Ella Holloway better after death."


	23. Chapter 23

twenty three

- Alex -

No one tell you what to expect when you die. There are no pamphlets in the doctor's office with bullet points on what you will feel, or experience. It was never talked about in the Wilds, because we all felt like we had already died. The rebellion was no help at all, on the subject, and even the books that I read, really didn't prepare you to what happens when everything goes black. Even if by some miracle someone was able to tell you word for word, detail by detail on what happens, I still don't think I would be able. Closing my eyes that last time and feeling the free fall of my body that never seems to land anywhere. It isn't one of those jumping off a building type of falling, but more like a slow descent. It is sort of like being underwater being sucked down. All you see as you descend is the darkness swallowing you whole.

They don't tell you that at the end, no matter how much you want to let go, something keeps you from giving up. I just want to let go, and forget, but something keeps me going, reaching up towards the surface. It connects me from like chains to the memories of emotion that causes my body to react. I struggle to separate myself from it, but it pulls me towards it. It really is a disease that simply won't let you die when you are tied with someone else, when you are in love with them. It is as if they are pulling me back into the light, when all I want to do is sink into the darkness.

"I don't believe it," I hear muffled. "Someone up there must be looking after him."

A pause and then a response, "no one looks after this garbage."

I try and open my eyes but the pain is too much. Am I finally dead or is this a nightmare? Everything feels like it is on fire. I try to see where the pain is but can't, it is everywhere.

"Wakey, wakey," I hear someone say with a singsong voice. "You didn't think it would be that easy did you?"

A bright flash brings my mind back into focus. The first thing that I feel is the insurmountable pain in my body. I want to moan because of the pain, but the taste of something metal in my mouth causes me to want to gag. The only thing I want to do is keep my eyes closed.

"Hmm, seems like he need a special wake up call," the same voice says.

It is then that a splash of cold water wakes me up, until a surge of electricity runs through my body causing me to convulse my whole body twitching, my arms and legs constricting trying to hold onto to something, anything. I don't know how but the electricity doesn't stop even after I hear a click. My body continues to jerk every so often, like those times when you are dead asleep and your leg jerks out.

I want to spit out the metal wire brush but my hands feel heavy and I can barely move them. My breathing is raspy and it is painful to breathe in. The pain, it is not a sharp one but a dull one. I can hear my heart beating quickly in response to the electricity and my thoughts are all hazy. The concrete on my skin has this gritty feel to it, almost as if I know where I am.

"Amazing," I hear someone say. "It is like he…" a hard kick to my stomach "…won't…" another one in my chest "…die."

I try to lift my legs to my chest, to try and deflect the blows but something is holding them. Everything feels like a bad nightmare, and the fact that I am unable to wake up, causes me to try and move. The laughter is loud and echoes all around me.

"You awake?" A gruff voice says near me. The fact that it is so close causes me to jerk back and my eyes open wide. The immediate head ache causes me to close my eyes again.

"Nice of you to join us," another calmer person says. "Would you be so kind to lower the lights so that we can have a conversation?"

A grunt of disgust is heard and then the lights are lowered to a level where I can tolerate. I open my eyes and see that I am in a room that has no windows. There are two men in front of me, one a heavy set man with buggy eyes that looked like there were going to come out of their socket. He was there rubbing his knuckles and muttering something in a low voice. He sort of looks like a fish in a market, it is kind of funny seeing him stare to me. Those beady eyes just stare at me with hatred.

"We are not much more civilized than them," the calm one says to fish eyes pointing at me. He turns around and the dark black eyes focus in on mines. The smile on his face is not one of happiness, but one of evil. He grabs the nearby metal chair and slides it over to me, sitting down about five feet from me. The calm one is slender and his uniform is nicely pressed. His dark hair is comb over and perfectly gel in place. He leans in to look at me; his calm demeanor puts me a little uneasy. It is the quiet ones, the calm ones that people told me to always look out for.

He just stares at me for what seems like an eternity until fish eyes decides to talk, or better yet, complain.

"Let's just end it," he says taking out his gun and cocking it. "After what he did to Johnson, I think this dog need to be out of his misery. One in between the eyes and then we can go home."

He places the gun right in between my eyes, and all I do is close them. It will finally be over, and then I can finally let go. It should be quick, but there I am waiting and waiting and nothing happens. I open my eyes and see that the calm man has fish eyes's wrist and is squeezing it so much that his hand is off the trigger. The pain in his face almost gets me to smile but I have to force my emotions to be as unaffected as possible.

"Do you know what we have here Roman," he says to fish eyes. Roman's mouth continues to be wide opened in pain so the calm one has to release his wrist for him to be able to talk. He lets the gun drop to a finger and then nods no.

"What we have here is a…opportunity," he says calmly. "You see, I checked in C.O.R.E. and you know what I found out?"

Roman starts to massage his wrist as he hostlers his gun. He makes a step back away from me and the calm one slowly leans back standing up to meet his eyes. If there were ever a symbolism of two dogs fighting over a piece of meat, this would be it. I look down at their feet and see the difference in between both of them. The shiny boots from the calm one and the scuffed up ones from Roman, the contrast in between both of these two men, gives me a sort of glimpse into the person, one being messy and the other anally attentive to details.

"This person here is a ghost," he says. "His ID card that we found says that he is Alex Warren. There is a problem though with him being Alex Warren. After digging into his past, I found out that Alex Warren died ten years ago of a heart attack."

Roman looks at me and smiles.

"If he doesn't exist, no one will miss him gone," he says. His yellow stained teeth matches the mustard stain on the pocket of his shirt. The look in his eyes, it is true what they say about the eyes being the windows of someone soul. Just one look into the eyes of Roman and I know that if the other one wasn't here, I would already be dead.

"Wouldn't it be a _good_ thing to find out if there are any other _ghosts_ in Portland?" He asks. Roman starts to laugh lowly and I know the implication of the comment. The torture that is coming is something that I do not know if I am prepared for. "So that would be the first question of today," the slender calm one says to me. "Give me a name of another Ghost."

He waits a couple of minutes there and all I can think of is the death that will come before I mention anyone's name. He starts to hum something and then stops and waves Roman in. Roman walks over behind me and then I can hear him kneel next to me. One hand clamps on my shoulder and then a sharp pain on the back of my shoulder blade that causes tears to form in my eyes. I scream, but it is muffled by the wire brush that was in my mouth. I try to jerk my arms free but find that my right arm does not move but is in constant pain. The whole scene blurs and then as the room spins, everything goes black.

When I open my eyes I see them both just there sitting talking about something. Can't really hear as everything sounds muffled but I can tell by the way they move their hands and expressions that it is an argument. From what I can tell, they are arguing about something to do with the amount of force that Roman did something. I let out a groan and that gets their attention.

He walks over to me and rips off the tape that was holding the metal brush in my mouth. Looking back at the slender man he opens his arms and then speaks in a loud voice.

"Happy?" he says. "Now he can talk."

"Very," he says. "Now if you please wait outside until I call you?"

He stands right next to him and drops the tape on the ground before he walks outside. The door slams shut and then I hear the lock slide into place. He takes out a pen from his shirt pocket and with the tip of the pen he bends over and picks up the tape from the ground. The way he is careful to not touch it, I can tell that he believes in the whole disease thing that the city of Portland has told them. He throws it out in a nearby garbage can and instead of putting the pen back in his shirt he lets go of it and it makes a thunk sound on the metal can.

He sits down on the chair and then finally looks at me.

"So sorry about that, Roman can be a little bit…enthusiastic," he says with a smile. He reaches into his shirt pocket and takes out small notebook. He opens the cover, looking at the writings on the paper with such focus that I feel like he has forgotten that I was even there to begin with. He nods at what he is reading and then finally looks up.

"From top to bottom. A possible concussion from the fall onto the hard concrete ground. A fractured left cheek bone from the butt of the rifle when you were knocked unconscious. Right arm dislocated, which probably hurt like all hell. Quite possible that Roman cracked your sternum, your ribs, or probably both. This of course could lead to internal bleeding. Do you feel a little fluid when you breathe? That means it could be your lungs filling with blood. There is the bullet wound on the back left shoulder blade, which removing it, can cause infection, which can more than likely kill you. The deep wound on your left thigh, and the fact that you cannot move, might indicate that you pulled the muscle. Hmm…I think that is it. Am I missing anything?"

He turns the cover of the small notebook over and then places it back in his shirt pocket. The fact that he can list all of my injuries tells me that he really doesn't care if I live or die. He stands up and walks over to the door, and just looks at it for a second. There is no movement in him to let me know what he is thinking, no facial expression when he turns around to tell me anything. He pulls his gun from his holster, and examines it. The gun is polished and clearly well maintained. He is probably one of those people who are obsessed with cleanliness and would more than likely dismantle his gun to oil and clean his gun, every single day. He probably has it timed to a specific moment in the day that he does the same thing over and over again.

"You tell me what I need to know and the pain can stop. I can finally give you what you have always wanted. The peace that you so sought when you thought you were going to die."

I nod and with tears in my eyes, I try and talk. The cuts on the inside of my mouth from razor sharp metal brush have made it nearly impossible to say anything that is above a whisper.

"Can't talk, must get closer," I whisper hoarsely. He turns his head over so that his ear is pointed in my direction.

"Closer." I repeat trying to raise my voice.

He comes closer turning his ear again to my mouth to hear what I have to say. He is probably about two feet from my mouth. I open my mouth and spit all of the blood and saliva all over his face and shirt. The splatter of blood drips from his face. At first I think that I have provoked him enough to call Roman back in. Probably he can lose his control, and this can finally be over.

He leans back up slowly, and I can see the tense muscles in his jaw flex as if he is upset. His hand balls up into a fist as he examines his shirt, which is now a mess filled with drops of spit and blood. I think in my head that I must have hit a nerve, made him lose his focus. He reaches behind his back and I think that he won't call Roman to come back in, but do it himself. This whole nightmare can finally be over.

It is then that he moves his hand from behind his back and a clean white handkerchief is in his hand. He places it on his face and rubs away all the spit and blood that had clearly gotten even in his eyes. He looks down to his shirt and tries to dab the shirt to see if the stain would come out. After a couple of tries, he realizes that it is useless and stops to look at me.

"Did you know that the human body has two hundred and six bones?" he says with a calm tone. "From the largest femur bone to the smallest metacarpals in your wrists."

He walks over to the garbage can and drops the handkerchief in it.

"As you can tell," he says. "I am a man that is all about order and attention to details. That is why they put me here, in this wonderful place, to learn how far a human body can withstand pain. You might think that it is a very long time, but really, the longest I have since is twenty two days before the person cracks. So the funny thing is that word, 'crack' because it leads me to the original comment on the number of bones. You see, I am going to have my associate crack and break…_every…single…bone…_in your body. Then we are going to do something that no one would expect. We are not going to kill you, because that is what you want. We are going to leave you alone. Give you food, and a place to sleep. We are going to let your body, even though you do not want to, get all better; heal all the bones that have been broken. When that day comes and you are all nicely healed, guess what we are going to do again?"

He pauses and smiles at me.

"You guessed it," he says. "We are going to break them all over again, and we are not even going to ask you anything. In fact you can only scream if you want. At the end you will be begging me to listen to you tell me every little thing that I wanted to know the first day. But of course, I won't be even interested in what you have to say. Doesn't that sound like a wonderful plan?"

He looks at me as if he is waiting for an answer.

"Go to hell," I say.

"Tsk, tsk, tsk. My dear boy, you have no idea what hell is. But I guess you are going to find out," he says walking to the door and opening it. I start to look around and know that this maybe the hardest thing that I have to do. My mind wants to give up, but my heart wills my body to withstand what is going to happen. A tear rolls down my cheek and lands on the ground. The rough concrete under my skin feels like sand paper and all I want to do is grab his gun. If I was able to hold it in my hand, would I be able to do it? One of the things that I never wanted was to end up like everyone that I cared about, trapped here in a place with no hope. The last thing I see if Roman coming back in with a smile on his face and a baton in his hand.

* * *

- Julian -

My eyes open and for a moment of helplessness I jerk up looking around me unsure of where I am, or if I am even awake. My heart beats irregularly and I can barely catch my breath. I put my hands on my ears, trying to drive away the screams. I can still hear it. I press my hands in tighter, as my lungs fail to get enough air. It is the same scream that is every night. He is still screaming at me even from the grave.

"Help me!"

The echoes reverberate throughout my mind.

They are so loud that my ears still hear them even after I wake up. It is the reason I try to keep my eyes open at night. I sit up there in the lighted room. I turn to the night stand and stare at the time. Every morning at this exact time, my body wakes me up. Most of the time it is the fear of another attack, the shaking of my hands, I wonder if one is coming or if it just the nightmares. I reach out to grab the cup of water there, and can see my hand shaking and quickly grab it.

Closing my eyes, I try and calm myself. It was one of the things that Doctor Reinhardt told me.

'It seems that stress is one of your triggers. When you feel stressed try and imagine yourself in a calm secured area. It will help you lower your blood pressure and can help avoid any new episodes. Also you would need to take one of these every day. It actually has been tested to help patients who have…your condition.'

The pale orange tube sits there right next to the glass of water. For two years I have been taking these things every morning. They tell me that it helps, but honestly I do it for my mother that worries about me. I can still remember life when I younger, before the 'incident' happened and everything changed. From the smiles and laughter that came from my mother to the eternal sadness that now permeate the walls. Even the colors of the blue curtains look affected. I wonder if it never happened would life be different.

'New York Mercy Hospital - Klonopin – take one pill every morning.'

They tried everything; desperation has a tendency to that. I was put through almost every test known to the doctors here, and even tried a couple of the old methods from before the cure. Who would have thought that this little orange pill with the big 'K' would keep me alive? It was what they called it, my 'keep me alive' pill.

Almost there, a couple more weeks and it will all be over. The burden that I have been to everyone that I know will soon be over. Probably the sadness would leave this house afterwards. This little thing, this round orange pill has kept it at bay, but in a couple of weeks the procedure will finally take away everything.

The water washes the pill down my throat and I close my eyes and flashes of those white hallways. The smell of the bleach still brings those old emotions, those old memories. The needles and the test didn't really bother me all that much. It was his reaction, the way he looked at me at that moment.

"Mr. and Mrs. Fineman," the doctor says. My hand tightens around my mother's hand. She looks at me and smiles. Her hand pumps my hand in reassurance and then she looks back at the doctor.

"Looking at his injuries," he starts to say looking down at the chart. His eyes then meet my father and there comes the first lie. "The bruising around his abdomen is consistent with a fall down the stairs. There are no broken bones; however there is something that troubles me."

"What is that Doctor," my father asks in a stern voice. This is the tone that he always does when he wants the other person to tread very carefully.

"Well we had to do a M.R.I., because a tumble…down the stairs we have to rule out any head trauma," he says with nervousness in his voice. "And we found this mass right here. I am sorry Mr. Fineman…"

He stops and looks at me.

"Probably it is better that we speak in private," he says looking back at my father.

"Speak Doctor," he says raising his voice. "Whatever it is…"

"Mr. Fineman, with all due respect, this sort of information should not be shared in front of umm…others. It seems that…" The doctor leans in and whispers to my father. He turns his face and that look of disappointment fills his face. It is that expression that, that emotion that still to this day, nine years, I haven't been able to shake.

"Tell him," he says. "He is old enough to know his destiny."

The doctor stands there still, as if he was punch in the gut. He doesn't know how to respond or what to do. It is almost as if it is the first time someone has ever told him to do this. He pauses and then kneels next to me.

"Julian," he says in a comforting voice. "We found something bad in your head. We are going to try our hardest to take it out of you, but…"

He turns and looks up at my father.

"Oh for heaven sakes," my father says pushing the doctor out of the way onto the ground. "Julian, they found a cancer in your head and you have a great chance of dying."

He looks back at the doctor who is on the floor looking up at me.

"Was it that hard to say?" he says to him in a defiant tone. My mother hand loosens just a little and I have to hold back the tears that have already started to form. It was the hard lessons that my father always told me, that emotions make you weak. You have to grab hard onto your destiny and accept your fate.

Nine years, and countless operations, and now my fate are almost complete. The procedure will either seal it, or release me from it.

Fate.

Funny word when you think about it. It is as if everything you do in life, you have no control in changing. That it will happen no matter what you do or how much you fight against it. That day my mother's joy died a little and every day since, it is as she gave up. It is hard sometimes to get her to smile, but probably today she will.

I stand up and my feet sink in carpet. It is the little things that I remember about him, it is the only thing can keep the nightmares from coming, the shadows of the past. The knock on the door and I know that breakfast is served. It is almost eight and although it seems like a regular day anyone outside of our little bubble, it isn't in my house. The guards that roam the grounds with automatic weapons always were the norm in my house but today there is an increase of activity. After the 'incident' security became like breathing, it wasn't something that we chose, it was a necessity of our very lives. The walk down the hall, I do not stop in the third bedroom like I usually do, but this time I just continue walking to the stairs. There is many people just coming in and out, some being stopped by security and others with just a show of a badge continue walking through. No one makes eye contact, but just like a machine, they serve a purpose and anything that takes them away from it, can cause the whole machine to break down.

The kitchen is just as busy as the rest of the house. The two chefs work tirelessly preparing the dinner party that my father is hosting tonight for the government officials of the city of New York. The aromas of course create an immediate reaction from my stomach. The growl that comes is low and loud. It causes both chefs to turn and finally eye contact is made.

"Master Fineman," Carlos says. "How did you sleep?"

"Good morning Carlos, I slept well. How goes the dinner?" I ask.

He gives out a deep sigh and wipes the sweat from his brow. You can tell that they have been working since early in the morning. The dinner tonight is a fundraising event that is meant to keep the funding for the DFA or the Deliria Free America that my father is the President of. Only the top governmental officials have been invited and all of them have RSVP that they will be coming.

"As well as can be expected," Paul the other chef says. "We finally received the Duck from Boston a couple of hours ago. Do you know how hard it was to get these blasted birds? I could have easily gone to Central Park and shoot a couple of those ducks in the lake and we would have been done long time ago, but you know your father."

I smile and nod. Walking over to the pantry I open it and look at the wide variety of cereals that we have there neatly organized. My finger goes from one to another and finally lands on the chocolate puff balls. It reminds me when I was six and my mother bought this particular cereal for me because it made the milk all chocolately.

"Master Fineman, I can cook you up some breakfast if you wish," Carlos says.

I nod no, and grab the bowl from the nearby cupboard. It is bad enough that my father had them waiting on ducks from Boston, but if he found out that they stopped cooking because I needed breakfast, I and they would never hear the end of it. The bowls are neatly placed in order of size from largest to smallest on each of the shelves. They are cleaned and shinny from being hand washed, even though we have a perfectly working dishwasher.

"It is okay, Carlos," I say. "I actually just want some cereal."

Sitting down at the small table in the corner, I hear the door open and can hear the strong voice even from the other side. I keep my head down and continue to eat a spoonful of chocolate puff balls. My mouth crunches slowly the balls as not to attract him to come over here. It is impossible to know his mood, his temperament. Whenever he has to travel, the whole house changes, it is like the light comes in from the darkness.

I hear the clip clop of his shoes on the wooden floor getting closer and closer. I put down my spoon on the table and just wait for the conversation to start.

"How funny," he starts. "That we still have this cereal after all these years. It is as if we still have small children here."

"Good morning Sir," I say automatically when I hear the pause in his voice. "How did you sleep?"

"Barely got any sleep," he says. "Someone had his _night_ light still on, all night. Kept the whole house up."

"I am sorry," I say. "I will try and be better…"

"Men don't try," he says cutting me off. "They don't try to do anything. They either do something or not."

"Thomas," I hear someone call out to my father. He turns and then continues to walk over, buttoning one of his cuffs. My mother helps him with the tie, as his button the other one. Her presence was always the one thing that can calm him. Her hands were always the one thing that can calm me. She always knew exactly what to do and what to say and even how to say it, to make sure that our family stood together. Finally he looks at himself in the nearby mirror and gives a nod of approval. It is then that the cell phone rings and I hear him start to walk towards the door before he stops and turns around covering the phone.

"Julian, make sure you are ready for tonight," he says. "And for God sakes make sure that do not have another one of your…things. Last thing I need is you…pissing on yourself."

My hand trembles and then finally tense around the spoon. I focus on the hard grains of wood on the table. I remember when I was a kid, tracing them with my finger, knowing every curve, every path. There are only three chairs now, but back then there were four. I feel her hand on my shoulder and then her voice next to my ear.

"You remember when we would race our fingers along the grain here," she says pointing at the nearby lines.

My fingers slowly meet hers on the edge of the table. Her voice sounds the same as it did nine years ago. It is the same whimsical voice that sounded like singing, or probably laughter. It is as if she came back, and finally I have my mother back, before everything collapse. I feel her hand on the other one, and slowly my hand relaxes and the spoon clinks on the table.

"You always cheated," I said with a smile.

"Cheated?" she says surprised but of course she knew it was true.

"Well every time I was about to win, you would suddenly tickle me," I say wishing I never did. She always did that to both of us and just the mention of him, always causes the shadows to come back.

Her finger retreats and I can hear her throat clear. She eases up behind me and walks over to the chefs.

"Be a dear Carlos and make sure that we remove the cereals that upset my husband this morning?" she says walking through the kitchen and then through the doors that lead away from me, and back into her own nightmare.

I stand up and then place the bowl in the sink, still filled with the cereal and milk. The brown chocolate milk still stares at me as a reminder of everything that was lost. My hand finally reaches up and turns on the sink letting the water dilute the milk, swirling away down the drain.

Carlos is about to say something when I speak up.

"It is okay," I say. "I guess I wasn't feeling all that hungry."

Through the doors and up the stairs, everything feels as if the walls are coming in. I grab the first shirt that I can find, and put on a pair of jeans, and running outside before anyone can even stop me. The backyard has this old gate that is always a security problem. It seems that someone is always leaving it unlocked.

The key was always easy to find, the most predictable man in New York lives here and always leaves in the same place that it goes missing. The grey sweater probably seems out of place but it was the only thing that I could wear that would make me seem like part of the people here in New York. The only place in the world that still has the old world philosophy that is so apparent. It isn't so much of what you think or even believe; it is about who you are, and what you wear. In my father's world, I am Julian Fineman, the head of the J.D.F.A., and the clothes in my closet are carefully picked out to be seemed as both presentable to the upper class and relatable to the middle class. It always felt well, not me. This grey sweater is the only thing I was able to get, before they came and grab all of his things.

The walk is quick and only a couple of block, but finally when I see it, it is as if the weight that was on my chest is removed and I could breathe again. The park is my only refuge whenever I feel as if I cannot cope. It is the place that we would go back then, and play on the swings. It is right overlooking the Hudson and it is the only place that I know I can breathe.

My hand grabs onto the chains of the swing and I can still hear the laughter that day at the park. It was one of my happiest memories of us, me and Ben. He always would come with me, whenever mom couldn't take us. It was my big brother looking out for me. He would sit in one swing and we would just swing back and forth until mom would come and get us. We would talk about life outside the fence, pretend that the disease wasn't really real, and that we could go anywhere we wanted. To be able to swim across the oceans, or even climb up the highest mountains. We didn't have bodyguards back then, only a nanny that would look after us when mom was with dad. Our father wasn't anyone important back then; he was only a local councilman just trying to make a difference. The disease took that all away, made its way into Ben, and now, has turned everything upside down. Its tentacles have reached far and wide, through the fences where it comes from. The disease has taken so much and soon it will take me.

I spend the day there, just swinging back and forth, walking alongside the paths, and finally just sitting on the bench there. I knew what would happen, and how it would happen. Pretty soon, they will find out that I am not there, and mom will send someone to come get me. It is after all my father's big night to show the city of New York how well adjusted we are, even in the middle of the crisis that is this Delirium.


	24. Chapter 24

twenty four

- Alex -

Darkness.

It is the enemy now. The first night they put me here, I couldn't sleep, I wouldn't sleep. I fought it for days, trying to keep my mind active by trying to move my fingers. The pain kept my mind awake. He kept his promise thought, and it was days that the pain was too great the broken bones that cause so much pain that I didn't know what kept me going. Then it became a sort of game to see what else I could handle, weeks of Roman instead cutting into my skin. There were moments when I passed out because of the pain, only to be woken up with a car battery. The questions stopped and suddenly it was just the beatings, and it really didn't hurt anymore, it was just another day. Just as it started it ended, and a day became two, and then three and finally a whole week without the door opening.

It was days before the true torture began. Honestly I don't know what day it was or even if it was night or day, but when it started it was as if I never knew true pain until it happened. The nightmares aren't what haunt you, it is the dreams. It was quiet, and I could hear the drip, drip, drip of an old pipe. The use of my hands came back a couple of hours ago, and although it was painful I could open and close my fingers. My fingers finally dig into the groves of the floor. The same loops, the same writings, on the wall as a constant reminder, as a constant battle. They laugh when they threw me in here, saying that if I was going to be a part of resistance might as well keep me in the same hole. The dragging of my body across the floor brought a sharp pain every time I made the effort, the bullet still lodge in my shoulder blade. Lifting my shirt into my mouth I start to inch my way towards the door. The screams are muffled by the shirt in my mouth, but half way to the door I have to stop my breath deep. It takes almost what I think is an hour to get from one side to the other. Once there I just prop myself up against the door. The cool metal door on the back of my head is a reward in itself.

Drip, drip, drip

With my left hand I start to work up and off my shirt. After a couple of tried and yelling through the pain, I finally get it off and wonder why the hell I took it off in the first place. I tie a knot and then slip my right hand into the opening. Looking up to the ceiling, I know what I must do and know that it will be the most painful. I place my right hand on the door knob, slipping it through the makeshift knot. I grab one side with my left and the other with my teeth and pull the knot tight. The pain already starts and I know that it will only get worst. Slowly turning my body clockwise, I am facing the wall but can see the door out of the corner of my eye. Closing my eyes I put my left hand to prop myself up. My breathing quicken as I try to prepare myself for it.

'Come on, you know this is what needs to be done.'

I move my left hand off the ground and lean to the side. The arm stretching and the pain are insurmountable. It is then that I hear it, a loud pop and then the tingling sensation goes throughout my shoulder and then the pain slowly drifts away.

'Move your finger.'

Nothing. The thoughts come rushing back. Probably it is too late, I have waited too long to try and pop it back in. I can feel my heart race and the fear begin to take over.

'Move your finger damn it.'

It is then that I feel the small movement of my index finger and my breathing begins to level off. I unhook the arm from the door and then just lay there on the ground. I try not to think of anything. In the beginning, the bullet wound caused an infection which my body tried to fight without medicine. An epic battle that I wanted to lose but the nightmares of people without faces chases me through the hallways, calling out to me. I had thought that it was the worst of it. It was when flashes of her started to come in, it surprised me so much that I didn't know how to process it, whether to be happy or sad. I started to think about life before Portland, keeping myself away from having to die all over again. Life before Portland was different, the times before we moved to the homestead in Portland. The winters of Rhode Island offered little to no cover and many people died. That is what started to the domino that I tried to stop. The thought of my mother dying in the snow as we moved from Rhode Island, it brings back my father and this awful place. It is when it happens. Her voice comes from the corner.

"What are you thinking about?"

It is the weirdest thing, that something as simple as her voice can cause both happiness and pain at the same time. The tears overwhelm my soul and the sadness creeps over me, taking over my memories. Like my very blood it flows everywhere, the sadness, and the joy together. I struggle within myself to wish away the memories. How I wish I had the ability to get the cure, and take away this pain. The memories, of her eyes and how it would just pass my defenses, my mind wants to stop but my heart wants to stay. She looks at me with a sort of sweetness. It is the way that she looks at me, so innocent and so free that causes my eyes to blur. The tears have already pooled and now stream along my cheek to the ground. It was the only thing I can do. With the last remaining strength I just lie there trying to block it out. My left hand goes over my ears and I start to moan. The memories are just too much.

"You aren't real," I say a little louder.

If I could only pass out, my heart would stop, my mind would take over.

"Alex. Tell me that poem again?"

It is as if I cannot stop it. A cruel torture for sure, but I start to think about this, how would they even know? They couldn't have known that we had gone over the wall that day, spent the night in the Wilds. There weren't any regulators in the community; it was the safest place that I could bring her to. The memory comes as if a wave by the pier, a painful wave that crushes me against the rocks and sucks me underwater. The dark room suddenly lights up with a dim candle in the corner, and then another one and seeing the bookshelf materialize. The crickets start to sound and then I feel something on my arm.

Closing my eyes, I take deep breathes, telling myself over and over again that it isn't real, that I am falling into madness. It is the syndrome of people who are infected. It is the reason why the walls are filled with the word 'love' over and over again throughout the walls. The schools of Portland, give every student the signs of the infection, but never tell you the full delusions that come at the end. This is something that Thomas once told me, that Ward Six was filled with people who would be swallowed up in the madness of their past, some never come back from it. It is as if I am being pulled to a cliff and fighting with all that I have to keep myself from falling over.

If they only knew, that it would take is this, and everything, I would tell them. The small sensation of a fingertip graces the top of my hand and immediately my hand jerks back in fear. It has to be a trick. This can't be real, but I can feel her the way her fingers use to trace my hand and then my arm. I open my eyes and see the candle light illuminating just a small part of her face. The smile that she can show comes so effortlessly, her eyes closes, waiting on me to tell her a poem.

"Please stop." I whisper to myself. The distance between us is so small but I know it is so very far away. Can I allow myself some sort of happiness? My hand reaches for her there lying next to me. I am thinking it, I am wishing it, but my hands do not move, they do not respond. It was a fool's dream to believe that one could experience happiness, especially in this world. The wilds are not the freedom we are seeking but a reminder of all that we lost. This is worst that all the beatings, all the broken bones, the bullet wound, and the shallow cuts that caused infections.

"No more," I say louder. "Get it to stop, please I will talk, I will tell you everything. Just get her voice to stop…"

"My sister used to stay on the shore…"

My right hand begins to move and I could swear that her hand is on my wrist. It is warm on my cold skin. I could still hear the ocean waves coming to take me, to take me towards the horizon. The roar that comes from the hole near the bed, it is the one place that I haven't gotten enough guts to face. It is the same place that she wiggled out, but now is barred, reinforced. The thought of her doesn't bring any happiness now; it brings the one thing that I want to forget. It is what keeps me here, keeps me fighting, even when I have tried so hard to give up.

Hope.

It is why the groves of the etching still paint the walls and even the floors. The walls have the word written over and over again. Love has the hope of being returned and it causes us that when we lose it, that we long for it again. The pain comes and I cannot stop it, the memories flood and no matter how hard I try, I cannot pull up the walls quick enough.

"…we would pretend that they were real cities, like we'd swum all the way to the other side of the world, to the uncured places…"

I see her there sitting on the beach, the day almost ending. It is the same image I had of her back then. The memories that I have fought to keep from coming back, has emerged with such a force like it has a mind of its own. Her voice penetrates deep and finds the anchor that was reaching out for her. Warmness begins to cover me spreading through every dark corner and finally, a peace blankets my mind, calming my anxiety. My eyes finally close and for the first time in a couple of weeks, there are no dreams nor are there nightmares, there is only peace.

"…they weren't diseased at all, or destroyed or horrible. They were beautiful and peaceful, and built of glass and light and things…"

It is those words that brings a peace in my heart that I thought I had lost. Now that I close my eyes, I can hear the ocean waves again and the thing that I realized is that the more I push away from her, the more my heart was tied with hers.

Standing at the edge of the cliff, I see what I must do. I understand now the etching on the wall, the dreams that Lena had of her mother on a cliff. At the edge of the cliff, I know that she would do the same, if she was here. She had to have made it, it is the only reason why my heart still beats. The wind works through my body, calling out to me, drawing me closer to the final epiphany. Closing my eyes, I can still hear her voice in my heart, telling me that it was okay, that she was okay. It could have been my own desires that she would find happiness one day, and that if she does that her heart was opened to it.

It is as if I could feel her embrace, her small arms wrap around me. I am no longer there in the cell of the Crypts. I am outside, in the Wilds, in the place where happiness lives.

"I have missed you," I hear her say.

"I couldn't," I say. "I tried. With everything inside of me, I tried. I just couldn't."

She smiles and there is a small tear that creeps up on me. It was there ever since I told her to go. Even then I knew that I couldn't.

"I am so sorry, Lena," I say to her, knowing full well that this is all a dream and that I am really not talking to her. The blurred line of hysteria, and full blown deliria has been passed and now I am with her and if only in my mind, it is better than the alternative.

"It is okay," she says.

"It is not okay," I say. "I am not okay. I should have been stronger, I should have been able to. But I couldn't do it, I was weak, just like my father. The disease won, and here I am talking to myself, but…"

"Shhh," she whispers drawing me close to her. The warm body that embraces me drives away all the fear and darkness that lies inside my heart.

"I couldn't…let you go," I say finally coming to terms with it. It wasn't the disease that kept me from dying that night. It has never been a disease, but a promise. It was the same promises that I had always read in the books of Shakespeare and even in the fairy tales that I loved so much. It is that same promise that I make that night on the floor passed out from the pain of reinserting my shoulder back into place. The promise that I will never let her go, and that although a small part of me believes it there is still hope that she will find love again. That all of this, the pain, the suffering, the lost, that it would have been done so that she could be free.

The fall from the cliff into the dark abyss is all I could do, to be with her.

- Julian -

Anxiety is a product of a weak mind. These are the words that my father told me right after the doctor told me that the disease was going to consume my life. It was his way of telling me that the emotions that we feel make us weak. It was his platform when the Deliria Free America first started. He capitalized on people's need not to feel weak. We were after all the United States of America and if anything history has taught us was that we are not weak when life hands us a bad hand, but rise from it and become stronger.

I look at myself in the mirror. It is the image of a person that sometimes I don't even recognize, the perfectly cut hair, combed in back straight and held together with this gel that smells like roses. It was part of the list of things that I had to take care of tonight before the party. All of the aides they go over the agenda for tonight, and as I grab the dark pink tie, I remember the stupidity of it all.

"Cannot be blue, because that is what your father is wearing, and it cannot be red, because that is overwhelming and aggressive. We certainly do not want to come off as aggressive to the benefactors. Yellow, looks weak, and of course the Finemans are not weak people." Marcy, my father's top advisors says to me with my mother in the room.

This woman has been with my father ever since he ran for city councilman, and then when he won, she became one of his advisors. Who would have thought that when he left after four years that he would start this organization? He took most of his staff with him, and Marcy has always been there alongside with Derek the head of security, always here and always 'advising.'

She puts a tie against the white shirt and looks a couple of seconds in the mirror, before smiling. Thank God she finally picked one, it took her an hour to pick one shirt, a freaking shirt, that no one will remember, and honestly no one really cares.

"This is it, don't you think? Not too aggressive and not at all weak. It will attract the women of tonight as an ally, but not to alienate the men in the crowd. Your age gives you the innocence, so today; let's play up on that, okay Julian?" She says handing me the tie.

The games and the strategies is always behind every decision, every speech, and of course even on what color a stupid tie is. Looking at the tie, I let a small smirk and my mother catches me.

"What is so funny?" she says.

"Oh nothing, just something I remembered about how to tie a tie," I say, not wanting to bring up the memories. It was when we lived in that little apartment and we were going to be part of my father's campaign. It was a way to show the people of New York that my father was a family man, who cared about the middle class. We were there, Ben and I in a small little room that we shared and he was trying to help me to learn how to tie it.

'Loop around the neck, one loop around the tree, up over the branches and through so you cannot breathe.'

We laughed at it, because it was a little rhyme that Ben had made up as a way of making fun of all of these things. 'The cannot breathe' part of course I understand now even more. My mother finally comes and helps me straighten out my tie and then gives me a small smile before turning grabbing my jacket and helping me put it on.

"There," she says brushing the shoulders. "You look so handsome."

I smile and then she turns and walks out of my room. The watch sits there on my dresser next to the mirror. I grab it, turning it and checking the engraving.

'Not enough.'

Putting it on, I set the time, seven o'clock. It is time to go and mingle, time to come from backstage and come into the show. I walk towards the top of the stairs. Marcy is there with a clipboard and a earpiece listening to something someone is saying. Her eyes focused on something that the person is saying, whether it is Derek or some other aide downstairs, she stops me with a raise of one finger. I stop and look down over the banister, and see the cameras of reporters and servers walking around holding silver polished trays filled with small little pieces of meat and cheeses and other things that I have never seen.

A hand reaches around my right elbow and crooks into it. I look over to the side and see my mother there ready and beautiful. Her smile is from ear to ear and although I know that most of it is false, there is still a small part of it is still her. We walk down the stairs hand in hand and then the faces come and go, people you have never met and really would never meet again after today. The pleasant conversations about the foundation and the upcoming events, are mostly what people talk about. Never really understood why so many people wanted to come to these things. From what I can guess it just shows people how different we truly are. The whole idea of it though I guess is justified because it does raise money for the cause, to control and hopefully in the future eliminate the disease. If we could raise awareness of the need for earlier procedures then probably what happened to my family doesn't have to happen to anyone else.

There is an increase of flashes and when I raise my head to see who is at the entryway, I see that it is the New York Congressman Tim Pine. He is one of my father's long time friends and strongest supporter of the foundation. He is about in his early forties, and he always had this sort of charisma that attracts people to him. You could always tell when he was in the room by two things, his deep radio voice laugh, and the fact that no matter how old or young you are, he always greeted you with a 'young man' or 'young lady.'

"Good evening Congressman," I say extending my hand. He looks at me and then smiles extending his hand to greet me.

"Good evening, young man," he says. "And I have told you a dozen of times, it is Tim."

It is the same formality that we always go through every time I see him. The same back and forth conversations that we have always had, with the same handshake, the cameras of course take the standard handshake photographs with the caption, Congressman meets YDFA Julian Fineman. It is only a couple of seconds for the aides to let my father know that the Congressman is already here.

"Thomas," Congressman Pine says with a smile. Turning around I see my father coming up to meet with the Congressman.

"Tim it is great to see you," my father says shaking his hand. "It is such a pleasure that you could come tonight, how is Nancy?"

"She is fine," he says. "A little bit under the weather, but thank you so much for asking."

"Come," he says. "Let's talk in private."

This is what the whole night was about. In this private conversation in his study, is where they talk to decide policy and where the state's budget funding is going. It is one of two studies my father has. Both of them on the first level, all made of this extinct wood called Sequoia, that was found back in Oregon one of the first lost cities to the disease. My father told me that they bombed everything in that city to the ground. Even the trees that surrounded the city were burned to the ground. He told me that they saved one as a reminder the disease will take everything if we let it. He made his desk from the wood, the dark red wood that is as strong as metal. All the history of the disease, medical findings, reports from labs on tests for a cure, the successes and the failures all in books in that one study. All that information on how everything started, about how the disease acts and reacts to certain medicines, all in one ten by ten square wooden room. The curiosity of the disease is what first sparked interest. My father talked about it almost every day at the breakfast table, how could Ben not get curious about it. I think like me, I think Ben just wanted to help.

"Come on," Ben whisper to me one night. "You have never wondered what was in that locked room."

"Well," I start to say trying to cover up the fact that I had just seen where he hid the key. I was upstairs and was of course thirsty when I walked out on the hallway. From my room you could see straight into the study. My father was on his tip toes putting a key into the rooster statue that he had always placed up high. It had to be the key to the other study.

"I might have seen something," I say to him.

"What?" Ben asks. "What did you see?"

I wonder if this would be the best idea, to tell him. Looking back, I wish I had never said these next words. If I could go back and do one thing, it would have been to lie, or not say anything at all. But of course I couldn't do it, and it set things in motion that I wish didn't have to happen. Destiny had other plans and if we are to do anything, it is to embrace our destiny.

"Does rooster lays eggs," I say. "Or is it just chickens?"

He smiles in the dark. That was the last day. It was when everything changed.

"Get some sleep," he says. "Think I will go get some eggs."

I tried to sleep at first but when I couldn't, all I did was just lie there staring at the open window. I don't even remember what time it was, or even when I fell asleep, but seeing him there looking out the window.

"Ben?" I call out to him.

He turns around and the emotion on his face is something of what I now know is disappointment and disbelief. His hand balled in a fist. It is only when I see him, that his face changes back and then a smile comes on.

"Hey Jules," Ben says.

"Jules?" I ask, unsure as this is the first time he called me Jules.

"Think you look like a Jules," he says smiling as he walks over to me. Finally like he is thinking of something, he says something that is random, at least the time I thought so.

"We may brave human laws, but we cannot resist natural ones."

I sit up and looking at him, I can see he is trying to mask the anger that he now has hidden inside. It sounded nice, but at the age of nine what the heck would I know what it meant.

"What?" I say confused.

"It was in a book, it is this amazing book about a captain named Nemo, and a sea monster and it was amazing, the writings of this author named, and get this, of all things," he says excitedly. "Jules Verne."

The name echoes in my mind. It was what he called me from that day forward. Of course just to bother him, I called him Verne, but he never did tell me about the book, and when I pretended to be sick that day, just to catch a peek, everything fell apart. It was the day I was taken to the hospital, it was the day that Verne felt responsible, and all the blame went to our father.

"Master Fineman," someone says with a little bit more firmness. I blink and see that the party is still going, and if it is an indication of the facial expression of the woman in front of me, I have been ignoring everyone, while lost the duality of human laws and natural ones.

"Yes," I say without turning to see Derek.

"Your father is requesting that you join him in his study," he says. I nod and walk with him to the study. There is a red velvet rope that has separated the party from meeting. The two guards stand there motionlessly until they see Derek next to me. One removes the barrier and the other one opens the door. Inside my father is sitting against the large wooden desk, and the Congressman is sitting in one of the chairs. My father looks frustrated and when he sees me, the look on his face is one of caution to not mess this one up.

"Tim," he says. "Here he is. Now you will hear exactly what I have been telling you. That he feels the same way that I do."

Standing up, the Congressman looks at me and then lifts up his hand to my father.

"Julian," he says. "I would like to hear your stance on what is next and the resolve of the foundations dedication. As you are aware, this epidemic isn't going away, and the main age group that is suffering the worst of it, is your target audience."

My father's face is the same one that was earlier this morning. How it is time for me to grow up and leave the childish things behind. It is time for me to truly grab onto my destiny.

"Congressman," I say clearing my throat. "My father knows that my resolve is absolute. This disease like all diseases in our lifetime have to be dealt with radically and with no prejudice. Like its ultimate result we too must treat it like death, with all means possible. You know my medical history and you know that all of the doctors believe that a procedure would not be in my best interest. But, Congressman…Mr. Pine…I believe in this so full heartedly that we have been in talks with the doctors over at Columbia Memorial to have my procedure done in two weeks. The same time that we would have a large rally to introduce our new plan for our target audience."

Just then a glass shatters behind me, my mother had more than likely just heard that in two weeks I plan to end my life. After all 'we may brave human laws, but we cannot resist natural ones.'


	25. Chapter 25

twenty five

- Alex -

Madness isn't that bad. I wonder if my father day dreamed about my mother. It was something that I thought of that morning. How long was he able to hold out for? He was there for years, did he think about her? Was it as painful as it was for me? All these questions and the only thing I could possibly think of, is that he went mad and died a totally demented person. It is what they tell you are the first thing to go when you are in the Crypts. Most of the time people from Portland say it is because of the disease but here experiencing it first hand, I think it might have been due the place that you are in.

My finger begins to trace the L that is nearest to me. It took me another hour just to pull myself up onto the bed. The good thing about living in the Wilds is that sleeping on the ground becomes natural and really doesn't bother me anymore. My finger loops the cursive writings of the "L" that is so embellished; it must have taken Lena's mother so long to do. It is then that I start to see the deliberate actions of not a crazy person but of a mother who was thinking about her child. The "L" of different sizes is littered all over the place. I examine the nearest one carefully, and find that the depth is deeper than the other letters. I imagine her mother starting to etch the letters and realize that it was about her. Just like everything in my life, it is about her.

I close my eyes and see the trees. The sunlight piercing through the branches, it reminds me of a happier time. My fingers touch the blanket and then finally I feel her hand next to mine. My pinky loops her pinky and I can feel the warmth in his hands. My head stands still, not wanting to break the delusion. That is what this is; a delusion of something that my heart wishes was reality. It reminds me of a book I read about a man who accepted a dream as reality and decided to stay in the dream world because it was better than living in the real world alone.

"What are you thinking about?" I say.

A couple of birds land on a branch and begin to sing their happy tune. From this angle, I can tell that the trees are the same ones from 37 Brooks backyard garden. It was our favorite place to spend the day. I wish I could have spent more days with her. We had to keep up appearances so in the mornings I would go to work in the labs, and she would go to her uncle's store. We would always meet up afterwards; it was my favorite time of the day. Even when it rained, it was the best times, because I spent them with Lena.

Everything reminds me of her. It is all that I can think about.

"I am thinking about, eating," she says letting out a laugh. "I am hungry."

I turn and see the smile on her face.

"You are always hungry," I say. "It is probably why you took the job over at your uncle's store."

She gives me a playful shove and when she tries to do it again, I grab onto her hands and pull her in. She doesn't resist and of course I just wish that this was real. The book that I remember reading was about a man who could only love someone that he met in his dreams. It turns out that at the end, he was given a choice, to live forever in the dream, and in reality be alone forever. It was the hardest decision that I think to make. Could someone even make it? If it came down to it, could I? The choice to live here in the dream forever and always being alone, it sounds like an easy one. If he were faced with the same choice as I, being locked away forever, the choice would be easy. I never did know how the story ended.

"Did I ever tell you, that I think this is all a dream?" I say.

There isn't a response, and immediately my heart begins to beat quicker in fear. I turn my head and still see her there. Focusing on her, I see the rising and falling of her chest, and the blinking of her eyes. I turn to face her, and she turns to face me. Her eyes are warm and for the first time, I see the smallest speck of yellow in the iris of her eyes.

"Why do you say that?" she says with a small smile on her face.

My hand reaches up and when it touches her cheek, she closes her eyes. My mind knows that this is truly not real, and that when I finally open my eyes, that I will still be in the cell of the Crypts with no possibility to ever see her again. This is something that I know all too well, the dreams that I wish were reality and nightmares that happens when one wakes up.

"Can you feel this," I say placing my hand on her cheek. Her hand comes up to meet mines and it is there that I can see it. The small dark mole that I had mistaken for an ink blot the first time I saw it. Licks my finger tips and tried to wipe it off of her, which of course she just laughed and said that it would more than saliva to get off. It was the smallest things that I noticed. Her nails and how she sometimes chews on them when she is nervous.

"Of course," she says.

"Good," I say and then realize that this path takes me back to reality. As hard as I try it seems that my mind cannot live here, although it seems it is easy for my heart to. If she isn't real, then why do I have to admit it, why can't I just let it go, and pretend that I am really here? What is keeping me from accepting it, I am giving my heart what it wants, and I am allowing her to invade my thoughts again. The weeks I spent being beaten and tortured, I kept her from coming in, and I kept myself from remembering. But now that I finally gave in, it is as if something is fighting to discover this as a fraud.

"Tell me a happy memory?" I ask trying to keep my voice from cracking. I try to mask my emotions, but know for a fact that I am simply no good at it, when it comes to her.

Her smile disappears, and now is replaced with a look of worry. It is as if she knows something is wrong. The one thing I prided myself in was the ability to never let anyone see my true emotions, to be able to read me. With her, though, it was as if we could always tell when the other was not being truthful, or at least when something was wrong.

"You haven't been sleeping," she says.

I stand up which for some reason is a lot harder and takes me a lot longer to do. I stand there hunch over placing my hands on my thighs. My legs creek and crack with pain especially on my left thigh. I close my eyes and shake my head. It is as if although I know she isn't here, it is what she would say. I feel like the defenses that I had constructed, that I spent all of my life putting up is fracturing. The dam that is controlling everything, my emotions, the pain that I have held in for so long, is fracturing. Control is the only thing that I have left. Even when they were torturing me, I didn't lose control, I didn't feel this vulnerable.

I finally suck in some air and then with a little effort I push myself up from my thighs. Looking down at my hands, I see the cuts, the bruises, of all that I had to go through. The shoulder begins to ache, each breathe becomes harder to hold, without feeling the bullet edge in between the ribs.

"Nightmares," I say. "It has been hard to shake them, even harder to accept them."

My eye sight begins to blur and I start to feel light headed. I don't know why, but I feel like I might pass out. I see her there and see her hand out and wait there for mines. The shakes are the worst when I think about what has happened. I try to move towards her, but instead of having any strength in my legs, I feel myself tip towards her. My left leg catches me from falling, and her arms reach around me to hold me up.

"Okay, okay, a happy memory right?" she says. "Ummm, did I tell you about the time the time that I danced on top of a high near a farm?"

I want to laugh but all I can do is try and breathe. It is that inability to concentrate that I am guessing has caused her to give in to my demands of a change of subject. I lift my head and find that she smiling at me. The grimace on my face changes to a smile, because she thinks of it as a happy memory. I try to remember the song that was playing but of course the pain that radiates from my entire body is distracting and I am unable to focus.

"No you haven't," I say. "But tell me about it."

She helps me finally straighten up. It takes me a couple of seconds before finally everything calms down and my breathing goes steady. I see her there and a couple of strands of her hair have come loose and it just softly touches her face covering her right eye. She is strong, it is surprising. Here I thought that I would be the one to keep her from falling apart, and now it is her that is keeping me from coming apart.

"It felt like flying," she says.

It is the same thing that I felt, when I kissed her. It was like for the first time ever, I knew how it felt to be her. The way the warmness radiated through my body, and instead of going out, it went inside of me, deep inside. It found its way through the places that I never knew existed, and it turned on something that I never knew was off. For the first time, it felt like I could breathe.

"I know what you mean," I say. "Dog peed tool sheds do that for me."

There is a slight red coloring on her face and then the smile grows just a little bit wider, almost as if she is going to finally laugh. It goes small for a tiny second and then goes wider again, like she is reliving it. My hand goes up to the strands of hair and finally I move it back away from her face. The heat from her face is undeniable.

"Is that your happy memory," she asks. "A dog peed tool shed? Sounds a little bit too typical."

"Typical?" I say a little taken back by the response.

"Are you sure that being like everybody else will make you…" she says.

It was the same thing that I told her. Just like that I am back in the peed filled tool shed. The way the moon light caught her face, I still don't know. All the books, about poetry and the epic love stories and still there is just not one word to describe how I feel about her.

"You forgot the word 'happy,' I say.

"Are you?" she asks as if it was the next line in the story.

"Am I happy? Well around you I really don't know any other way," I say smiling. I nudge her and she just blushes. My hands reach up cheek. The warmness from her skin is evident and causes my hand to touch her cheek. It is the next words that I told her that brought this whole thing around.

She stands on her tippy toes and I lean in to hear her whisper.

"Here, let me show you," she says softly. Her lip touches mine and like that I feel the same warmness that I did the first time. A tear streams from her cheek and I feel it touch face. Moving away from her I see that her happiness is now gone and all that there is, is the same sadness that I tried to forget. It feels all wrong, like the colors are too bright, or the sounds too crisp, almost as if it is too perfect. Is that even possible that she is too perfect?

"What's wrong?" I ask. "Is it my breathe?"

She nods no.

"I only wish..." she starts before she stops her eyes travel towards the ground. She begins to bite her lower lip. My hand reaches for hers that are now cupped together. She takes a step back and then looks at me in the eyes and says.

"What?" I say.

"That this would be real, that you would be real," she finishes a little hesitant. My hands feel metal, and it is confusing to my mind that although my hand is still on her hand, I don't feel the warmth anymore, but something hard and metal.

Suddenly there is a loud noise that causes us both to stop and look around. We try to find where it came from. Without warning it is as if something has caused me to lose every little bit of breathe in my lungs. When I try to breathe it, there is another sharp blow to my stomach, and everything goes black and when I try to open my eyes I see the grey walls and the etching of Love all over.

"So you can walk?" I hear a gruff voice. "Well we will have to fix that, won't we?"

I instinctively put up my arms to cover my face, leaving my mid-section exposed. It is the realization that I am back in my cell, and that Roman is beating me into the ground that I focus on what he had said before. 'So you can walk?' It seems that I was experiencing some sort of sleep walking and he caught me. I feel his steel toe boot connect with my rib which my body reacts to by rolling around trying to lessen the blow. He finally stops and I can hear the huffing and puffing of his breath. I hear him hock up some spit and then feel it a second later on my face.

"Filthy garbage," he says in between breathes.

Garbage? The word just resonates inside me. We are held here in these cells for doing absolutely nothing but think for ourselves. It would be so easy. I mean I could do it in less than five minutes. The burning desire rises inside of me, the images of my hands around his neck, come quickly and stay lingering there for a second. I wonder what it would feel like, to feel my hand squeeze the breath out of him, to feel the snap of his wind pipe in my hands. I could easily do it, right now as he struggles to gain his composure. Trip him up right now and grab him by the neck. I close my hands into fist, testing my strength.

'On the count of three,' I think to myself. It would probably be the end. They wouldn't keep me alive after I kill one of their own. It wouldn't matter; it is not like I am going anywhere. It would give me what I have wanted since the first day. It would be better.

'Don't,' I hear her say in my mind.

'You aren't real,' I say to myself, knowing full well that she probably didn't make it and died in the Wilds. The winters are not the easiest to survive even if she was able to make it to a homestead. It is hard to quiet but I still hear her in the back of my mind, it is faint but it is there.

'This isn't you,' she says softly. The tears start to form in my eyes, so I place my hands on my face, wiping off the spit on my face. Roman lets out a loud laugh as he finally starts to stand back up.

"I wonder what is over here," he says walking towards the corner. I open my eyes slowly and see him pick up the metal bucket that is hardly ever cleaned out. I had to smack it against the wall in order to get it to a point. This allowed me to be able to dump it out. If not the smell would be unbearable. It is why after a while the hallways have to be cleaned with bleach. Well that is what they do in other five wards. Here in Ward Six, it is never done, and people in those rooms go from being unable to dump it out, to simply not caring and going anywhere. The good thing about this is that the summer months are coming to an end and the hot humid weather, the smell will be less.

He picks up the bucket, and begins to walk towards me. It is what I had feared he would do. He beats his hand on the bucket as he walks over here. If I get up it would show that I can still stand up, and probably then I get knocked down. If I try to defend myself, it would only bring more pain.

'Let it go,' she whispers as I see the bucket thrown in the air. It comes down and splashes all the urine over me which I was able to deflect with my arms.

My hands start to shake, and I begin to count down.

'Three…two…one,' I say and then inexplicably my fist relaxes and I let the pain hold onto me. It is as if she is in the room and all I can do is think of her. It is extensive, but I made sure to keep my legs from blocking the blows. Although it is important to be able to breath, the use of my legs is something that I haven't been able to do in a while. The only thing that I would have to remember is to do any healing in the night time when there is not that many guard patrols.

* * *

- Julian -

Everything that happens in the last couple of days is a blur. Although I had promised Congressman Pine, that my dedication was absolute, my doctors however are another story. They had filed motions in the court system stating that I was incapable to make my own decisions and that I am suffering from some sort of break of reality. It is the simple terms to say that I must be crazy to want to have a procedure that can at the end of the day, kill me, or leave me brain dead. They argue with the lawyers saying that no one in their right mind would choose death over living, that I must be either depressed or suffering from some sort of strain of the deliria.

My father leans in to my lawyer who sits down next to me.

"Object to that," he says. "How can we not submit my son to the cure of a disease that they are now saying is causing him to want the cure? It doesn't make any sense."

My lawyer stands up and objects. He clears his throat and makes the argument to the mediator that stands before us. The mediator ponders on the argument and then finally declines this argument as 'trying to have their cake and eat it too.'

"So is he depressed, suffering from deliria, suicidal?" The mediator says. "I am confused but aren't you doctors? Didn't you take an oath to save people?"

"It is more complicated than that," one of the doctors bursts out. "His case is a special one."

It is then that in that little room of the New York Department of Justice, that the doctors and the lawyers begin to argue amongst each other. It took a call from my father to the Governor of New York to get this special session approved after someone leaked that the decision was made to get the procedure done without the approval of my doctor. There were even allegations that my father was trying to get falsified documents, to pretend that I was someone else in order to get past the initial medical history check. I had only heard of this rumor from a couple of the servants that said they overheard my father talking to someone on the phone.

"This is all a circus, a farce," my lead doctor barks out to the judge. "This is all motivated by a political agenda. Mr. Fineman doesn't care about Julian's well-being, he never has."

The room comes to a halt and then finally the Judge addresses the doctor.

"You have first-hand knowledge of this?" the judge asks.

"We have a source," the doctor says. "But to respect the well-being of this source we cannot name them."

So it is true. Someone on my father's team has betrayed him, feeding information to my doctors. There is a change in the demeanor in my father's face. He goes from calm to a slight annoyance. I have only seen him once really upset before. There is a vein that begins to throb from his neck. It is his tell, that something has finally gotten to him. Betrayal always has that effect on him. No one really knows about this tell my father has, and I don't think he even knows about it. The only way I know is because once I caught him lying to a police officer, that night when they found Ben.

"Enough," the judge says. "I request that everyone in the room leave with the exception of Julian."

The doctors are the first to protest saying that I wouldn't know the medical ramifications to my decision. The question is on my ability to make sound decisions and how it might be impaired by the disease, which it is the reason why they are here. There is protest on the legality of it all.

"I will make that decision when I hear from him," he says.

Everyone finally stands up and once they all leave, the judge lets out a big sigh of relief. He looks like he is in his forties, and the grey hair, shows me that his stress levels are usually high.

"First time I have actually had to deal with this," he says to me with a smile.

"I am sorry about this," I say.

He lifts up his hand in protest.

"Not your fault," he says. "But I am curious on why you want to do this, knowing full well the health risk behind it."

I sit there looking at my hands, and for a moment I do not have the politically correct answer. It is there that I see my watch. It is what I never have enough of.

"Have you ever been to the Aquatic Center down by meat packing district?" I ask. He looks at me puzzled on what this has to do with the question he just asked. I reassure him that it will make sense in a minute, so he says yes that he has been there. He tells me about his children and how took them there to show them how to swim. It is the place where most if not all government officials take their children to learn how to swim.

"My father took me there to learn to swim," I say trying to recall the memory. The smell of chlorine still gives me the shivers. "Must have been four or five, and of course we had instructors there to teach us how to swim. After an hour of hearing the instructors, my father was fed up and took me by the hand to the deep end and threw me into the pool."

The look of shock on the judges face and I know that he wouldn't have done that to his own child. It is true that my father had always been a cold and hard man but it is probably because that is the only way he knows how. He never talks about his father, and I never know him. My mother doesn't even know him. The only thing we do know is that he died when my father was young.

"Of course I panic and my father had to yell at my instructors to leave me alone. That either I drown or swim, those were my only two options," I say. "Now the question is this, if you were drowning because you never learned how to swim, would you fight to keep alive anyways?"

He looks at me, and then finally he understands what I was trying to say.

"If I had the choice of living or dying, wouldn't you think that I would fight to take that chance that I could live without the fear of it coming back again and again," I say. "The cure might be risky, but there is the smallest chance that it could take away the ticking clock from me."

He stands up and thanks me for my honesty. I shake his hand and he escorts me outside, telling me to let the lawyers know that he will need time to decide. Walking outside the door, I see the doctors there and the lawyers. They all look at me, and when I tell them what the judge said, my father already gives me a smile. It is as if he knew that some way somehow I would make the case. We walk down the hallway and then get into the elevator. The judge's assistant told all of us that he would give us a call when the decision had been made and that it would take anywhere from an hour to probably a day to decide.

The car is brought around and as we get into it my father tells the driver to go to the Jarvis Center. I don't know if the silence between my father and me is out of respect, or anger. He sits there looking out the dark tinted windows as the car zigs and zags through the streets of New York. I look down at my watch and see that we have a couple of hours until the meeting starting. Today is the DFA's monthly meeting for new members. It is where we go over what is on the agenda for the next couple of weeks and months.

The snow on the streets always made everything so calm. No one is walking on the sidewalks and even rarely do we see cars on the road. I always loved this time of year in New York. The snow mans that we would built in the front yard was always a epic battle to see who can make the better snow men. It is only about five minutes or so from our destination that my father's cell phone rings, removing all silence from the car.

"Yes?" he says calmly. He nods as he listens to the person on the other side of the phone. "So it is set? When? The sooner the better. Tell them that we will shoot for March twenty-third. Okay, thank you."

He hangs up the phone and then looks at me.

"It is done," he says. "March twenty-third has been set for the procedure, like we had originally planned."

The date is set. I don't know if I should be relieved or anxious. It was the only thing that was holding up funding for the DFA. Now that we have it, the next phase of my father's vision can happen. Additional chapters of DFA's in the other cities, to push for earlier procedure age limits, to advances in the actual cure. The complete eradication of the deliria in all of North America, it is what he has always wanted and now we have the funding to do it, we can finally start expanding.

We arrive to the Jarvis Center and taken backstage to prepare for today's meeting. The preparation team starts by getting me into the correct 'look.'

"Our audience today will be the younger demographics, so we will need to appeal to them," Marcy says handing me a red polo shirt and dark jeans. "The suites will make you seem out of touch, and well this look will work better."

I nod and take the clothes walking to the dressing room. Marcy calls out to me not to forget that a prep security meeting is in five minutes and that I would have to hurry. Every function, whether it is at home or in locations, we always have these ridiculous security meetings, to know what to do in the event of a terrorist attack. Ever since Ben, we have always been on high alert, for any attacks by the Invalids. They say that they are amongst us here in the city. That they can mimic any normal person, which of course sounds a little farfetched, but I do it to please my mother. It is the only person I wish was here today. She couldn't come to court today because she was feeling under the weather. There in my dressing room, I finally have just a tiny bit of privacy.

The security meetings are routine, and everything goes smoothly. The people fill the auditorium that has every member of DFA supporter in the state of New York. They all come in with their wool jackets and gloves. My father goes up and of course begins to welcoming everyone to the auditorium. He talks about the humble beginnings of the DFA, and how even the brochures where folded by his family. It was back then, that we would always do it as a family. In my father's study we would fold brochures all through the night, and make it a game to see who can fold them neatly but still fast enough to beat my father.

"They talk to us of risk and harm, damages and side effects. But what risk will there be to us as people, as a society, if we do not act? If we do not insist on protecting the whole, what good is the health of a mere portion?"

My father's speech is of course took weeks and several drafts to complete. It was tested on focus groups and even changed due to the current political climate. It was always the way he did it, that I found the most powerful. He always left it as a choice between the good and bad. He presented a case and then at the end left it to the person to decide what they will choose.

"This must be our single, unified purpose. This is the point of our demonstration. We ask that our government, our scientists, our agencies, protect us. We ask that they keep faith with their people, keep faith with God and his Order."

I look around and see people there listening to him, hanging on his every word. It is the way he inspires people. The questions he puts the people in the audience. He doesn't tell people to do anything but through his words he has them do it anyway. He is the grand puppet master, always in control of the situation even when people think that he isn't. Even now when I think about it, earlier when the doctors saying that they have an inside source, it didn't rattle him, it only provided him with either a name or at least validated the person's existence.

Marcy nudges me and I look over to her. "It is time for your speech."

She hands me note cards and I nod to her. Looking back towards the stage I see my father and he is already introducing me.

"…Members of the DFA, please welcome to the stage my son, Julian Fineman."

Without any hesitation I stand and begin to walk towards the stage. Thank God that they are clapping loud enough to hide the hard beating of my heart. A little trick that my father taught me when nervous, that a head nod gives a heads up to the other that their hands are sweaty and that to avoid the traditional greeting.

I stand at the podium and place my notes on it. It is the same speech that I had written weeks ago. Just like my father's speech it was tested on focus groups and then rewritten a couple of times until it tested well. I scan the room looking for a person to focus on. It was something that I learned from Marcy the first time I had to give a speech in front of people.

'Focus your speech as if you are talking to one person. Personalize it and then it is just a conversation. People focus on the large crowd when they should focus on the person instead.'

My eyes land on a girl, in the back row. She is a pretty girl in a light colored blouse, her hair is up in a bun and her eyes lock on mine. I think to myself if I can talk to that one girl about the important of the cure what would I say? I imagine myself sitting in a coffee shop her in front of me with a cup of coffee. I can picture it in my head. Someone who is in doubt of the cure sitting in front of me wanting to know why she should. The notes on the cards simply won't do. The talk of the history of the disease isn't what will convince her of it. It will have to be something more.

"I was nine when I was told I was dying," I say and pause. It is the truth of the story, that the cure is like being told that you are dying. "That's when the seizures began. The first one so bad I nearly bit off my tongue…"

The blood that I spit out was really what freaked me out the most. My teeth had gotten a hold of the inner part of my cheek and when I started shaking shredded it.

"…During my second seizure, I cracked my head against the fireplace. My parents were concerned."

It wasn't really the truth. The only one concerned was my brother and my mother. The image however that we have to maintain is that we are a loving family and not what we truly are, a bunch of strangers who cannot even look at each other.

"The doctors told me a tumor was growing in my brain and causing the seizures. The operation to remove it would be life-threatening. They doubted I would make it. But if they did not operate – if they let the tumor grow and expand – I had no chance at all."

Looking down I see the watch. 'Not enough.' My father looks at me and I know that if he would have seen it, he wouldn't attribute it to not enough time, but that my brother wasn't good enough.

"No chance at all," I repeat. "And so the sick thing, the growth, had to be excised. It had to be lifted away from the clean tissue. Otherwise, it would only spread, turning the remaining healthy tissue sick."

My eyes lock on Marcy and she grabs the papers in her hand. Looking over to my father, I can tell that he is not pleased, that I have gone off topic and off subject. To him, this means nothing, my past, and almost dying, he would consider a test of character, and right now I am failing because I am complaining of it. I look down and catch the paragraph on the operations.

"The first operation was a success, and for a while, the seizures stopped. Then when I was twelve, they returned. The cancer was back, this time pressing at the base of my brain stem."

That was when Ben died. The memory still fresh, the nightmares still echo, him yelling for me to help him. My hands tighten on the podium, wishing I could just be honest with them. Tell them how the disease has taken everything from me, my happiness, destroyed my family, and has left me to wade through this life alone.

"I've had three operations since the first one. They have removed the tumor four times, and three times it has regrown, as sicknesses will, unless they are removed swiftly and completely."

Three times, the doctors were too scared to take it all out, saying that I might become brain dead if they mistakenly remove an area that is not cancerous.

"I have now been cancer free for two years," I say focusing on the free part of the statement. The crowd all begin to applaud loudly. I put up my hand in thanks and to quiet them down.

The cure would be the only thing that can give me the freedom that I seek. It is the only way to be completely safe.

"The doctors have told me that further surgeries may endanger my life. Too much tissue have been removed, too many excisions performed," I say. "If I am cured, I might lose the ability to speak, to see, to move. It is possible that my brain will shut down entirely."

I focus in on the girl in the back row. It is to her that I am now speaking to. In my mind we are still in the coffee shop and she is still not convinced.

"They have refused to cure me for this reason. For more than a year we have been fighting for a procedure date, and finally we have arranged one. On March twenty-third, the day of our rally, I will be cured."

They begin to applaud, but I continue with my plea now to everyone in the crowd.

"It will be a historic day, even though it may prove to be my last. Don't think I don't understand the risks, because I do. But there is no choice, just as there wasn't when I was nine. We must excise the sickness. We must cut it out, no matter what the risks. Otherwise it will only grow. It will spread like the very worst cancer and put all of us – every single person born into this vast and wonderful country – at risk. So I say to you: We will – we must – cut away the sickness, wherever it is. Thank you."


	26. Chapter 26

twenty six

- Alex -

'2,364'

Lying there facing the walls, I start to count in my head from one to two thousand three hundred sixty four. The little things, the repetitive things, is what keeps me either sane or maybe it inches me closer to finally going over the deep end. I keep myself extremely still, so that if anyone does come in, they do not have a reason to beat on me.

What number was I on?

I let out a deep sigh and begin counting again. One would think that it is such an odd number two thousand three hundred sixty four, but it makes sense in my head. Looking at the first one, I start there. My eyes scan the wall, looking for it. It is always the first one, the one that I start on. It takes me a couple of minutes and then finally a smile registers on my face, the first etching on the wall, the largest one, the deepest one.

The first one? When was it? The thought begins to file deep into my mind searching and probing. It opens the doors to deep closets and climbs the ladder to the highest shelves in search of it. The first one?

I guess it would have to be the ocean. I nod at the memory, and think, that it is an appropriate first one. The cool wind whips through the opening in the floor of my cell. You would think that it would cause me to shiver, but this time, it actually reinforces the feel of the ocean breeze that day. How it would just work its way up through the smallest cracks in your clothing, getting inside to the warm places. Getting inside. That sounds about right. It is like her, the cool wind, and how it found its way inside. Even now, even from this distance of who know where she is, she still finds her way inside. It was all I could think about, that day standing there explaining it all to a group of strangers.

'Right before the sun rises there's a moment…'

I close my eyes and I see the sun rising that day. It is that moment that I search for. It is what causes my heart to calm down and beat in a regular manner when all the cool winter wind wants to do is speed it up. She was standing there right on the cliff of labs looking out into the bay. Her arms where crossed almost as if she was embracing herself. She just stood there looking out into the horizon, I still don't know how she did it, but that day it was like her gaze stretched all the way, I don't know if it ever ended.

Yeah that is a good one. I think that will be the first one today. The way her eyes could gaze through the anything and everything, like the cool winter wind, that can make it way through anything, how just a small gaze from those eyes and you were locked into her.

I always wondered how she did that.

From what I can gather, I have been here in this little room two thousand three hundred sixty four hours. Finding this little bit of information was like being able to tether yourself from insanity to reality. It wasn't like I was trying to find out, but found out purely by accident. I was able to get the date a couple days ago by overhearing a guard.

'I have been waiting for the 21st for months and now that it is here, me a Janine, we are going to go have Thanksgiving Dinner and, I cannot wait for this shift to be over.'

I couldn't believe how it was already November. How was it that I had lasted this long? Quickly counting down, it was probably ninety six days since last I saw her. It was only a couple of weeks ago that they finally left me alone. The guards stop coming down here; it must have been the fact that the smell just became unbearable. The hole where Lena's mother escaped was never refilled, so the smell from my cell escaped through there.

It was there that I could start to see the changes in the seasons from the hot weather, to the beginning cool weather. I know that the cold weather soon enough will consume me, and hypothermia would set in. The first things that we learned in the Wild, to protect yourself against the extreme cold, was to keep your mind from becoming foggy.

'Ninety six days,' I remember saying out loud. 'I wonder how many weeks that is.'

Thinking of the times I spent in school, and then it comes to me. It is almost fourteen weeks. Funny how you can make yourself feel good about being imprisoned by math. The mind just thinks it is such a short amount of time, that probably I can attribute this to a nightmare. Reality though always finds a way to set in when almost every bone in your body that has been broken begins to ache, or how the cold weather makes it hard to breathe with the bullet between my ribs. When it started to rain that day, my mind took me to another math problem. How many hours are in ninety six days?

It was the day that it rained so hard that I honestly thought it would never end that I finally realized the number of hours that I have been here.

Two thousand two hundred and four.

There are no watches, or clocks, so it is only an estimate, it is only an assumption. Taking naps, in the middle of the day or through the night hinders my ability to know for a fact how many days or hours truly I have been here. It was only until I heard the guard that I had an idea. It gave me the start.

It was painful at first to know that it had been so many days, like the warmth in my body, hope was leaving me. I spent that night staring out of the hole, trying to get the cold to overwhelm me, trying to see if I went to sleep this night that probably I dream and never wake up.

The reflection in the water I started to see the stars up in the dark sky. It was probably the clearest it had ever been in a while. It is always like that after it rains. Everything just feels so clean and calm. It reminded me of the first time she saw the stars out there. Which got me thinking, that if I am here for two thousand two hundred and four hours, might as well think see if I can think of two thousand two hundred and four memories of why I loved her so much.

So what number was I on?

The drip, drip, drip, of the hallway water pipe echoes through my cell. I can hear everything. It seems that in the winter times, people go quiet. I remember that it was when most of the people here in Ward Six, just stopped altogether. The complaining from the first cell, every day and every night, yelling something that he is now cured, or the moaning, the constant moaning that comes from the cell to my right across the hall, that never stops because who knows what pain, either physical or mentally, who ever knows. The one that really gets to me though, is the whimpering from next door. It is a cross between a soft cry of a person, and something like a rusted door swinging in the wind. In the winter, today, it all becomes quiet. Everyone that has been here longer than I have, knows that it is time to hold onto something, if they want to live.

Let's do number eighty five.

I look down at my feet. Still can't believe what she said.

'You know you have weird looking toes,' she says suddenly. I try not to let the comment bother me. It was after all the game we were playing. To say things that would get the other to lose the straight face.

'Thanks, I had always wondered what other people thought of them,' I say looking out towards the sunset. 'Even asked Rachel about them, she told me that they looked okay to her.'

There is a pause but then I feel a pelt of sand on my head. Looking over to her, I see the shocked face she is making and know that I have won the game. I shake my head trying to get all the sand out of it, but of course this is all a distraction, while I grab a little bit of sand in my hand and chuck up in the air, and wait for it to fall on top of her.

She lets out a shriek and quickly stands up. I had checked to make sure that everyone had gone or that they were too far away to hear anything, but the shrieking was a little unexpected.

'Hey,' I say lowly. 'You might want to bring it down a couple decibels; I don't think the sea gulls heard you.'

It is then that I hear her laughing.

'See I win,' she says. 'Got you to come out of character.'

'Yeah? How do you figure' I say. 'After all I got you first, so technically I won.'

'What is more impressive, scaring someone like me that has lived in Portland all her life,' she says. 'Or someone like you, who has been trained for this?'

She does have a point, I think to myself, and of course would never say that to her, ever. It was a great memory. It is the kind of memory that you hold onto when you are trying to not die of hypothermia. The walls look a darker grayish color and for some reason the quiet don't bring any sense of peace but an ominous feeling.

It is then that I hear the click of the hallway door. With the squeal of the door opening I hear the boot hit the concrete and the steps echo with a finality that brings a shiver to my skin. The whistling of someone coming down the hallway is happy and very much out of place here in the Crypts. . Behind it, I hear something, and cannot guess what it is. The jingling sound of keys and then the loud click of the lock bring an immediate reaction of closing my eyes. I put every ounce of effort into the sounds that I can hear and make out.

A rustling, and then a faint click and then a humming sound. It is then that I hear a zapping sound and can only imagine what caused it. It is done two more times, until finally I hear a voice call out.

'This one is dead. Arrange for pickup and scrub down.'

That is when I hear other footsteps walking and then finally a thud and the hallway door opens and then closes with a loud thundering slam. One by one, the zapping sound either gets a yell or silence. You would think that a simple shaking of a person would be enough, but the brutality of the guards is a given here to the ghosts of Ward Six.

I jump every time I hear the door slam. My breathing begins to quicken as I hear my heart beating faster and faster. The clip clop of the shoes as they finally arrive outside my door. My body stiffens and the shivering begins. I quickly look down at my feet and wonder if that was the reason they took away our shoes and socks? It was just before the first snow fall; they walked into each one of our cells and just took them. That night, the shivering started, and it was the first time that I knew that I would die here. The keys jingling outside my door and I brace for what is going to happen. I run through the scenarios, and wonder if I just started talking when they walked in, he wouldn't zap me with whatever he had in his hand. If I stood, it may cause him to be enraged and beat me until I was unconscious. Whatever I must decide to do, I would have to do it quickly. So knowing that fighting back would not be the best way, I just lie there. The door swings open and the footstep edge closer and closer. The click of the device and then the hum of the current, and I wait for it to come. Closing my eyes I make one final attempt to think of her before it happens. I don't know how it is that my body always knows right before the pain hits, because I flinch before anything even touches me. The electricity that runs through my body rips me away from my memories of Lena, and all I think about is not giving in. It is the exact opposite of how it was in the first couple of weeks, when I welcomed death, now all I can do is fight with everything that I have to not allow them the satisfaction of me dying. The screams don't come until the battery of the thing dies out. It seems that in his eagerness to thoroughly check everyone in Ward Six, the battery ran out when it reached me.

"Stupid thing," I hear a familiar voice say. "Chris, give me yours, I still don't know if this one is still alive."

There is a smile to his voice and I know that although everyone can see me move now. The moans and groans that come out of me, is sign enough that I am still alive, he doesn't pity me and wants to just torture me for fun. There is a hesitation from the one guard called Chris.

"Roman," I hear another guard say. "That is it, this one is still kicking."

Probably revolted by the conditions of the cell, or even the way this cell has scribed over and over again the word love, that Chris may think that he can catch the disease from me. I open my eyes and look at him, looking around with horror. He is covered in protective clothing and even has gloves and boot covers on. Amazing he doesn't have a gas mask as the crazies think that this deliria can be passed via the air. I am guessing he is new and seeing how I have never seen him before, probably is transferring in from another Ward. He taps the stick trying to get a little bit more out of the wasted batteries.

"Come on," he says tapping on his watch. "We still have to get the bodies over to the incinerator. Don't want the disease spreading now do we?"

- Julian -

Two weeks from now it will be all over. I think about this standing in front of the empty auditorium. Everything has gone exactly as planned, like clockwork. It was a fight but in two week, they will perform the cure on me, and if the doctors are right, then my mind will shut down, and then everything will stop. My father of course will blame the sickness and the DFA will be stronger than ever. There is though the smallest possibility that it might work. They worked out the statistics to be around 4% that it will be successful. I think about it though for a small fraction of time, and wonder what life would be if it were successful. I have read books, approved books mind you of what to experience one you are cured. It is as if everything wrong in your life is simply taken away. If it was to happen and what I want most to be taken away would be the memories.

That I think would be the most difficult for all of us. To be tied to those memories that hurt us. Like a scar of a long healed wound. It might be that the wound has been closed up, but the memory of it will always be triggered by the scars of it. I wonder though, would all the memories be gone, or would it only be the painful ones? If I could, ask them to keep some memories, would that be possible? I mean I don't know how they do it, and I wonder if specific memories could be saved.

I sit down and grabbing the remote I start to flip through the pictures. It was going to be places that I wish I could go off to. Sometimes I even dream that my brother is there instead of dead. To be free enough to climb the highest of mountains, and see the world from the peak, it was something that I had always wished I could do.

Click

The oceans coast with no one around, the sunrise just a couple of minutes ago. It was the memory of my mother's laughter that stirs something inside of me. I feel it coming from the deep recess of my heart. The sadness that I have held back all this time, the emotions behind missing out on a brother that I truly never got to have known.

Click

It is my favorite picture and of course the hardest to find. All these pictures of places from the time before the cure, always stirs something inside of me. It is something that pulls my heart in the direction that my mind always stops me. I close my eyes and there I can see them, the trees in Central park. I can just hear the single bird that started singing that early morning. I could feel her hand gripping mines so tightly that I felt that it would fall off without any circulation. It happened right after the incident with my brother. She had woken me up very early in the morning. The look on her face was something that I had never seen before. She was genuinely afraid. I think she might have seen the shock in my face, because she quickly smiled and whispered in my ear.

"Grab your things," she says softly. "I have a surprise to show you."

As she puts a shirt over my head I can see her eyes look constantly to the closed door. It was as if she felt someone was coming. She holds out her hand to me and as I place my hand in hers she gives me a smile and we walk to the door.

"Now you have to be extra quiet, Julian," she says. "This surprise is only for you and me. Okay?"

I nod and we walk as quietly as we can to the kitchen door. It is there that I see a book bag on the ground next to the door. She picks it up and then opens the door slowly; trying her hardest not to make any noise, even the clicking of the door. She quickens the pace and all she keeps doing is turn back towards the house. Once we are out the back gate, we walk without talking to park. The sidewalks were empty as it was very early in the morning. Her hand would squeeze every time a car would drive by. Something has her scared and this of course I do not understand. It isn't until we are well inside the park, hidden in the trees that she finally lets out a sigh of relief.

"Mom, what is wrong?" I say.

She turns around and then sits down patting the ground beside her. I sit down and then she looks at me.

"Nothing dear," she says. "How do you like your surprise?"

I look around and find nothing but trees.

"What is it?" I ask.

She lets out a laugh and then leans in.

"This is our special place where you are allowed to be yourself," she says. "You can tell me anything here."

There is a long pause at the thought. I can be myself there? It would be nice to finally not have to have to pretend.

"Can we live here?" I say with a smile.

She only smiles.

"Maybe," she starts. "One day."

A tear begins to run down my cheek. It is then that I hear a thud behind me. I quickly stand and turn around. In the distance I see the silhouette of a person. Could it be that someone has caught me looking, or worst caught me crying. It is the last image someone needs of the supposedly strong leader of the Youth Deliria Free America. The glare from the projector temporarily blinds me as I walk towards the figure.

"What are you doing here?" I say waiting for my eyes to focus. The lights come on and the projector finally turns off. "The meeting's over."

The person lifts up a hand and then says.

"I-I lost my glove."

The soft sweet voice catches me off guard. The girl's face comes into focus and then I realize that it is the same girl that it focused my speech on. Almost immediately I feel a sense of nervousness come over me, and can feel my heart begin to beat just a little bit faster. It is the oddest thing, but when my eyes begin to focus, it is as if As I walk towards her, my breathing begins to even out. Her hair is neatly brushed back into a pony tail. She has on a thick brown coat and there is something about her, I don't know what it is.

"Where were you sitting?" I ask hoping that she couldn't tell that I was nervous. "I can help you look for it."

"No," she blurts out almost immediately. She turns around and starts to look for the gloves. She moves from row to row, catches glances towards me. She moves to the next row and I know that she is almost there. If she would only ask me for help I could tell her exactly where she was sitting. Finally it is almost as if she remembers where she was sitting because she goes directly to her chair and lifts up the gloves.

"Found it," she says turning and beginning to walk back outside. I walk towards her trying to catch her. She is almost at the door when I ask her a question.

"How long were you standing there?" I say loudly. It is the only thing that I could think of. It is the dumbest question. From the location of where she was standing, and from the time that I turned on the projector, she easily could have seen all the pictures.

"What?" she says turning around. Her eyes finally meet mines and I catch something. It is surprise.

"How long were you there? How many pictures did you see?"

I hate him. It is the first thing that I think of. All these years, I have been struggling, swimming against the current, trying every morning to not be like hi and now that I am standing in front of someone, I don't even trust her. The thoughts that come, come automatically. The tools that they gave me, the pre-function security detail meetings. All the prep work from the advisors on how to speak and how to control a conversation, it is as if a button turns on, and everything that I am or trying to be, gets removed.

Instead of trying to accept that this person left their gloves in the auditorium, I am trying to find out if they are lying, if they have "a tell." It is the easiest way to find "a tell" of someone. Something that I learned from my father's security team, to get a tell, you have to get them to lie. I know how long she has been there, by the number of slides the projector has shown. It was the third slide, and if she told me any different then it would be her tell.

"I saw the mountain," she says finally.

"We're looking for strongholds," I say. Some weak attempt to cover up the fact that I am as jaded as him, that all my strengths to change my destiny, and I have ended up just like him. Never really trusting anyone, or questioning everyone's intentions. "Invalid camps. We're using all kinds of surveillance techniques."

She smiles and says, "I hope you find them, I hope you find every last one."

I nod and she turns around pushing the auditorium door open. It is then that I hear something very faint. I can't really make out what she is saying.

"What did you say?" I ask just as she is walking out into the hallway. She turns around and says a little bit louder. "Before they find us."

With that, the door slowly closes. I stand there looking at the door and something compels me to follow her, to apologize to her for my actions. I am not my father, I am not him, I will not become him. The footsteps grow quicker as I walk through the security check-point and then the lobby. The glass doors are in front of me and as I push to get outside, I feel the emotions rising to the top. The pain, the guilt, the anger, the sorrow, it comes back like a rushing wave and as I stand there looking down the sidewalk, all I see is the sea of people just walking by. The buses motoring past me, probably holding this girl that I was especially mean to. Turning around I see my reflection on the doors of the auditorium. It is there that I see him. I don't see me, here surrounded by the buildings; I know that I will never be able to be myself. I only see him. This is my life, if I survive it. No matter how hard I try, I cannot escape him. Hidden behind my smiles, and my actions, there lies the worst possible reflection of me.

I long to be back when I was younger, when it was my mother and me in the woods of Central Park. I don't even remember how long we were there, just lying there watching the sun light trickle through the branches. We didn't talk, but what we did, is we allowed ourselves to believe that we could escape our lives for just a little bit. It was as if nothing in this world matter, and even the seizures would magically disappear there. We didn't make it though. The sun started to set, and she finally gave in, and she took me back, we went back to the house where my father yelled at her for so long that after a while it sounded like noise and no longer human.

She cried for hours and hours, until my father got some doctor to prescribe medication for her. It was never the same after that, and now it is all I can remember. We never did go back to that park. Through the daily injections, through the mountain of pills, I never saw her, the way I remembered her again. It was like she gave up. There were times though that the sunlight would peek through the tree branches and I would see her again, like that day where all I can remember was the laughter and the safety I felt there with her. What will he do, when I am gone? After he took Ben, he took my mother, and now as I stare at the mirror of myself, he is taking me as well.

I look down at my hands and see on the floor a single solitary rock there staring at me. Without think I stoop down and pick-up the rock, and through it towards the door. It is as if time starts to slow down and the rock sails through the air as if it has wings. It is only when the rock hits the glass door that the sound of the city comes back. The noise of the horns of the cars, and the people walking by being to sound louder and louder and louder, forcing me to cover my ears.

The shattering noise stops everyone in their tracks. It is like time stands still. Everyone in this world has been conditioned to be happy. They are told that everything will be okay, but for it isn't. They all look at me with shock faces. Everything goes black and the next thing that I see is the lights on the ceiling of a hospital. The beeping sounds next to my right ear, is the same rhythm of my heart beat. I hear the voice of my father coming from the hallway.

"You see," he says angrily. "He isn't getting any better; the symptoms of the deliria are increasing. Do you honestly believe that the cure will not be better than to let him continue his life like this?"

"Mr. Fineman," a doctor comes into view. "I understand your frustration, but you have to understand, that we have never had a case like your sons. I don't know if we can make a case for the cure now. We might have to postpone the procedure next week, until we know better the effects that they are having on your son's condition."

He places his hands through his hair in frustration. Obviously he looks upset, but at what I don't know. It couldn't be because of my well-being, but more about the promises he made to city officials that I would have it done by next week.

"Look I don't care what your opinions are," he says. "Our lawyer has a decree from the courts saying that this procedure will happen next week. You just make sure that none of this gets out, or I will have your ass."

My eyes move from the doorway, and then finally lands on the big round clock that ticks away the minutes and the hours, ticking towards the day that is sure to come. How can you stop destiny when it was what you were born for?


	27. Chapter 27

twenty seven

- Alex -

What is the difference between dying of hypothermia and dying of starvation? Or better yet, what is there a difference, if dying is dying anyways?

This is what I think about now as the winter goes colder and colder. There is a fear that creeps up on me, that everything is becoming more silent here in Ward Six. In the beginning, was the extreme shivering in the night time that would only stop when my body would shut down and I would fall asleep. I had hope the first day that I wouldn't wake up the following morning, only to come back to this never ending nightmare. Honestly I do not know why I haven't died, all the warning signs are there. All my thoughts are all jumbled and I spend more time sleeping than doing anything else.

The cold winters are always hard in the Wilds and in the Portland. The one thing we learned was how to survive when you have little to no food. The signs of starvation are always subtle but deadly of course. Most of the people in the Wilds stock up what they can and starve in the summer. It is the only way to have anything to eat in the winter. Here in the Crypts there is no storage space, to keep the leftover food. I had ripped off a portion of my pant legs and tied it at the bottom to create small storage bags. It was the only thing that I could think of. I kept it near the coldest part of the cell to keep it from spoiling. Once the wind started to get cooler, I started to eat less and less, trying to place the food in the small two bags. The slop that we are fed does not hold up that long, and there are times that eating spoiled food does more worse than starving.

Most of the time, I can't think of anything to focus on. I try harder and harder to do the many things that I love about Lena, but now it is as if the memories are fading. Now only thing that I can do is just say her name over and over. At first I try to make sure that it is clear, but now it is just mumbling.

I try to turn my head but find that even that action is too much. My body no longer asks me for anything, and the hunger pains have all but stopped. Probably it won't be that bad. The days all jumble up together and I don't know if it is Monday, or Tuesday. I remember hearing some sort of cheering, yesterday was it, or was it last week? The cheering could only be New Years? It would make sense, though. It could only be January, I think to myself. It was the beginning of the coldest moments of the season. The typical weather dips in the night time to around fifteen degrees or so, and in the day time it goes only up to thirty.

How do you know when you are dying? There was something about seeing a white light? For days I had thought that the following moment would be my last. Of course it didn't happen and it was as if a cruel joke, that my whole life was a butt of some pathetic love story. I guess that is the only way that love could be worth anything. It is those epic love stories that seem to always end in some tragic manner. I think of Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet, the epic love story and probably this is the way that it was supposed to end.

My eyes close and suddenly all I see is that all white place. There is nothing, no beginning and no end. I want to lift my hands but realize that if there is no end then what the heck am I going to reach for? Is this it? The end?

If only I could have found some sort of peace. The not knowing if she made out. This is the only regret that I have. Everything else has turned out exactly like it was supposed to. I turn and see nothing.

'This can't be the end,' I think to myself. It has this sort of finality on it though, like it probably is and that I am powerless to stop it. Probably that is what scares me the most. It isn't that I am probably going to die right here and now, that my whole life actually meant absolutely nothing, just another pause in life. You would think that the realization of this is what I am finally so scared about, but it isn't that which pulls out to me from deep inside me, but that I am powerless to change it.

I close my eyes. Probably realizing that is the thing that has kept me going, and now knowing that I have no control in it, hasn't finally let go. There is a peace in my heart that seems to overtake my senses. There is no longer the silence of nothingness that greets me, but it is a familiar sound of a sea gull that rings in my ears first. Then with the same jolt, my nose catches a smell of sea water, clearing my nose and throat causes my lungs to expand trying desperately to capture it all, wishing to hold it in, if that is even physically even possible. My mind thinks that it couldn't be possible; trying to remind me of where I am. It seems that my body doesn't get that memory at least feet and arms don't. The soft smooth sand materializes without warning and my toes wiggle trying to dig deeper into the warm sand. The arms finally tingle with the prickles of the warm sun rays, making its way down my shoulders to my elbow and finally to my hands where I clasp them together rubbing the warmth into my palms.

'Do I even dare to open my eyes,' I say low enough thinking that someone could over hear me and take it away because of course this is all a nightmare. I struggle with it for a couple of minutes before finally giving in and slowly opening them, trying to face the warmth of the sun.

I feel a smile immediately form as my eyes register a memory of the beach at East End. The pack of sea gulls cry out way off into the horizon. I look down and see the sand that my toes had previously experienced with delight. It is perfect, the caramel colored sand mixed with the sad grey dirt giving it a very unique consistency that could only be from the beaches of Portland.

It is then that I have this immediate sensation that I am not alone here in my final moments of hysteria. That in the deep recesses of this madness there could be someone else here, because that is what this is my mind accepting the madness of hypothermia or could be starvation finally eating away at my mind. It is different though, because you know when someone is in your hallucinations that you have created, because they have this sort of fakeness to it. This of course is not what I am feeling, because when I finally turn towards the person I can see that she is not fake at all, but rather more real than anything.

She stands there with her arms crossed. The small black mole peeks around the inner part of her elbow. I always thought it looked like an ink blotch. She doesn't face me, but just stands there looking out to something. For some odd reason I just stare at her, not really caring if anyone catches me looking, if that was even possible. I guess it is true what they say, that true insanity is the same as sanity but without societal restrictions. It feels like it has been weeks since I was able to imagine her. Whenever I tried to dream about her my mind couldn't. Even when I tried to dream about her all that would happen would be that I would pass out.

This is how I am able to confirm that I am dying, because my mind is probably giving all its effort in order to even get this far in my hallucination. The feelings all come back and the first one that hits me is this desperation to be near her. Almost as if I hadn't seen her in months. It is then that I realize that I haven't, not really, nothing but a cheap imitation.

I hear her shifting her feet and look down. We are probably a couple of feet apart, so I shift my feet and now we are so close that I feel the heat from her body on mines. I instinctively twitch my pinky up and out, grabbing hers. She maneuvers her hand until our fingers are interlaced. I squeeze her hand and a smile comes on her face almost instantly.

"You ready?" she says sweetly.

It is as if we both know what is happening and have come to terms finally that we will see each other soon enough.

I lose my train of thought, when I think. 'Could this be heaven and we are both dead?'

"For what," I respond.

"For the race," she says.

My heart sinks. It is the bittersweet revelation that this is just a memory. It is a memory of the day that I am trying so hard to forget. It was the day that she looked at me with fear, with disgust. It is truly a nightmare. The tears weld up inside me like an underground spring waiting to be discovered.

"I was born to win," I respond trying to keep my composure.

"Oh really?" she says.

"One...three" I say running into the coast. In that second my hand tightens around hers and I am not racing but rather guiding her into the ocean. She lets out a shriek and then laughter so high that I have to turn around to make sure she was still there. Her smile is so wide that I immediately smile at the thought that I have never seen her so happy.

We jump together as the waves come. It is as if we move together, one body, two hearts intertwined together by love. My heart beats a steady rhythm as we close in on the finish line. It is only a couple of feet away when I pull her up to me.

She is still laughing which of course causes me to laugh along with her. It wasn't really how it happened in the past but it was what was supposed to happen.

"Alex," she says in between taking deep breathes. I look over to her as she takes a deep breath so that she can talk.

I pull her hand and she moves weightless over to me. I don't let her say one more word before I place my lips on hers. If this is it, then let it end like this, let the feeling of her gentle lips be the last thing that I remember. My hand finally lets go of hers and as I pull myself from her she looks at me confused.

"Thank you," I say already knowing what I have to do.

"For what?" she says.

"For letting me love you," I say turning and going under the line that divides the open water from Portland. Her facial expression changes immediately and with a desperation in her movement she reaches and grabs my hand. I want to turn dive under and swim out to the ocean but her hand squeezes tightly.

"Don't you do that," she says with such intensity that I am suddenly fearful. "Don't you say your goodbyes."

I can't help it now, all the emotion erupts like the dam has been violently torn apart. The tears start to flow freely. Why did she have to ruin this moment? Doesn't she know that it is no use; I will never see her again, never truly feel her, or even know what it would have been like to a have a full life with her. To see us grow old together, this will always be just out of my reach.

"Just let me go," I raise my voice to her. "Please."

Her tears begin to roll off her cheek. She closes her eyes and shakes her head no.

"You go, I go," she says with a sense of resolution. "You die, I die."

It is the one thing that I could never do. No matter if this isn't real, it is the only thing that I have. It seems that even now, my heart does the one thing that it only knows. It finally just gives in to her.

"Okay," I say sighing, lifting my left hand up to her chin wiping away the tears that have rolled down her cheek. "You win."

She loosen my other hand, which allows me to cup her face in both my hands.

"You know it is getting a little bit annoying," I say with a smile.

"What?" she says. "Me always getting my way?"

My hands come down to the water, and she just looks at me a little bit. The way she just responded, it is something new. I haven't ever seen her like this.

I shake my head yes, before I splash a little bit of water at her. She lets out a shriek and places both hands up trying to shield her face. Once she realizes that she can't she starts to throw water back and just like that, things are back to the way they should be. Her face no longer shows sadness but the laughter registers a wonderful desire to be happy. Is it possible that as I die, to die happy?

Finally she starts to yell something about giving up, and places a hand up in surrender.

"Do you surrender?" I ask grabbing a large cup of water in my hand.

She nods, and says, "but I have to tell you the terms of my surrender."

I smile and tell her, "okay, what are they?"

She leans in to my ear, moving away my hair that is now dripping. Her hand reaches and grabs my cheek pulling me closer to her ear. The trickle of the drops of water makes it way from my cheek down to my jaw.

"Hold on, just a little bit longer," she whispers. This throws me off, and I have to move back a little. The drop finally reaches my chin and then a shaking occurs. My eyes close and then open. The sight of the grey walls causes the happiness to fade away.

The odd thing though, there is another drop of water that hits my cheek as the words echo in my mind.

'Hold on, just a little bit longer.'

"What the hell," I say as I feel the second tremor. My head turns up and sees the dripping coming from the ceiling. A pool of water comes to a single point right above me, a single drop of water falls and I see it there making its way to my face. It must have seeped through a newly formed crack in the concrete. It takes my mind a couple of seconds before I realize that something is happening. The silent cold winter night has been interrupted by something.

The alarm startles me as the third tremor a much stronger one, drops me to the floor.

- Julian -

The winters in New York, always brought a sense of calmness to me, you know the snow. Everyone else in the city hates the snow, because it makes everything so difficult to maneuver, and of course the layers of clothes one has to wear just to keep warm. I don't know, I guess I just see things differently. Spending most of my life in hospital rooms looking out, this time around it just looks like a world I probably will not get to experience.

When it snows everything just slows down. You really can't speed off, walking or driving in the snow and well it forces you to really focus on the smaller things. The whole city quiets down when it starts to snow, the cars are less on the streets, and well it makes it seem just so perfect.

Staring out the window here, the park just seems so close. The snow light sprinkles the trees and the view of the lake bring a reminder of ice skating. The trees sort of look like Brussels sprouts dipped in sugar, although the taste would more than likely be awful. Turning my head, I look at the lovely food that they had brought me, and now think that Brussels sprouts covered in sugar seems more appetizing than this.

Even the smell is revolting, causing me to finally place the lid on the food and push it away.

"You have to eat Julian," the nurse says checking my vitals. "You know that you have to keep your strength up."

Most of the nurses know me by name, because I have been coming to this specific hospital for years now. The first time I came here was years ago, the doctors had finally been able to correctly diagnose me. I think I was probably sixteen or so, when the first time I met Nurse Johnson. She was just getting out of college and this was her first job. Of course it took me a while to talk to her, after all I had no experience with girls, and well Nurse Johnson was the closet one to my age.

"Well, everything that I have placed down my stomach," I say thinking about the next thing. "Makes an encore."

She walks over to my bedside grabbing my wrist and checking my pulse. After a couple of seconds she lets go of my wrist and grabbing her chart she scribbles something. Trying to peek at what she wrote, she smiles and then pulls the chart away.

"Let see if we cannot get your stomach back in-line with the rest of your body," she says.

"You know what would be great? I single stack from Big Boys and a vanilla shake of course," I say.

It was the first thing that Nurse Johnson told me that first day we met. I had gone skating on the lake in Central Park. Of course no one was there, and of course no one came with me. It was a normal day and the skating was amazing, so free and the fact that I could go as fast as I want it was great. I still think of that day though, because as great as it was, as free as I was, almost like a bird, I couldn't out run life and the reality of where I am. The cracking of the thin ice that I never noticed until it was too late was my alarm clock. It was what brought me back to the reality that I wasn't meant to fly, but destined to always fight.

Spent the next three weeks in the hospital meeting everyone and you want to hear the worst thing. It was the nice to have people talk to me, to have friends. She was so concern the first night that I was here, that she asked me if I could have anything in the world to eat, what would it be. It became our inside joke, the single stack burger, and her favorite was the vanilla shake. She told me the oddest thing to do, is to dunk the burger into the shake and eat it like that.

It wasn't half bad when I finally was able to do it.

"I thought your stomach wasn't in any condition to eat anything," she says with a smile. "Seems like that includes the single stack burgers."

"Well that would be the exception," I say. "Don't you think to dunk the burger into a cool vanilla shake?"

"Of course," she says smiling. "Cannot have a single stack without a shake. It is too bad though, that if we did that, your father would probably have me fired."

It is true that my father is a She begins to walk around my bed and is about to leave my room when I call out to her.

"Yes?" she says.

"How much longer will I be here?" I ask.

"Well your father is petitioning to get you out today," she says. "So this little release form here with your vitals is all that is needed."

"Kicking me out huh?" I say.

"Well you will be back in two days anyways," she says with a hint of sadness in her voice. I have been in this hospital for more than five days. They did every test known to man, and still all they could say is the same thing that they have always been saying.

'We don't know how the disease is affecting his emotions, and we will not know what will happen when the cure is administered.'

She stops almost at the door, pauses looking at the door knob before walking out.

"I really hope that I don't see you in two days," she says without turning around and then walks out.

I really wish that was my choice, but it truly isn't. Even if I wanted to call it off, I couldn't. The rally is important and the cause is important, and this statement, this procedure is important to both the cause and to my father. If it can prevent one more person from getting infected then it is worth it.

The ride home is silent and as always filled with tension. My father just sits there looking straight forward. The anticipation is what drives me crazy, the not knowing what will happen. He is the most unreadable person I know. Even the smallest ticks are hard to detect. I don't know if he learned how to do this, or if he was just born like this. Maybe it is a bi-product of the cure, after all the cure removes the emotions of the disease, and probably for our blood line it will be the same way for me.

He taps on the divider glass which causes the driver to lower it.

"Charles if you would pull into the park?" he says flatly. Charles our driver nods and takes the next right instead of a left. It is then that I realize that I don't really know how he feels.

"Right here is fine," he says as the car comes to a stop and the glass divider comes back up giving us privacy.

A fear begins to rise inside of me. The only thing that I hear is the beating, and Ben yelling out for him to stop. It echoes as I remember seeing how mad he got at the realization that someone was leaking information about my condition to the lawyers. My heart beat quicken, as I feel my hand tighten in anticipation.

"Sir," I start to blurt out. "I am sorry…"

He stops me by putting up a hand. He turns looking outside the window.

"Julian," he says calmly as he turns around. "There is no need to explain, the outburst is not the reason why we are here. There is another matter that we have to clear up."

He grabs the briefcase that is by his feet and places it on his lap. He cycles through the combination lock until I hear a click for the locks. He opens the briefcase and then places it in the space between us. It is ragged and the cover is all but torn, but there staring straight at me is my brother's copy of Great Expectations. It seems that although it is my room, he has gone through it, looking for anything and everything.

I don't know how to react, whether to be angry or to be ashamed. It was the only thing that I could find in Ben's room. I must have spent days there sleeping on the floor on the carpet away from the door. I would of course wait until everyone was asleep, before tip toeing over to my brother's old room to just lie there. I couldn't sleep in his bed, so I just decided to sleep on the carpet. One night I was watching the stars from his bed and heard that someone was coming. I of course just slid underneath the bed, holding my breath. Turns out that it was my mother coming into Ben's room, or at least she tried to. I only saw her bare feet in the doorway there for at least twenty minutes quietly sobbing before she turned around and walked back. Turning my head back to get out, I caught a glimpse of something there and that is how I found the book.

"Do you know where I found this?" he says with a firm voice and tapping the book with his finger.

One thing that I know I could not do is lie. He of course would see right through it, and if he found the book, he found it in my room underneath my bed in the exact same spot that my brother had placed it in his.

"Sir, in my room," I say lowering my head.

He opens the book to the folded page. It was the folded page that my brother had done. In it, he had underlined the book a specific passage in dark red ink. I am sure that he must have read it many times and then decided that he wanted to always remember this quote, that it probably defined him. I read it every so often and find that same comfort, the same familiarity of it.

He points to the quote and with an even tone tells me to read the underlined passage out loud.

"Sir, dad… I am sorry,…" I start to try to explain.

"The line, Julian," he reiterates to me more forcibly.

With my heart still in my throat, I look at it, stare at it, and then start reading.

"So throughout life,…" I say stopping to look at him. He points at the book and tell me to continue.

"Our worst weaknesses and meannesses are usually committed for the sake of the people," I say holding my breath. It is now that I realize why he told me to read this passage, and why my brother underlined it. It is what defined him, but wasn't something that consumed him.

"Committed for the sake of the people…" he repeats the passage, trailing up as if to tell me to finish the story.

"…of the people whom we most despise," I finish the line.

He closes the book and then I look up at him.

"If you believe this, then it means that you identify with this…this trash," he says. "This book is from my private library of banned books, and you want to know why they are banned?"

I sit there quiet, and it hits me for the first time. He isn't angry more than he is afraid of this thought. It was probably what scared him the most with Ben. The fact that his son's action was in a direct relationship with the person he most despised.

"They are banned, because they inspire the incorrect thought," he says. "I am not even going to venture in how you got into my private study, that isn't what I am interested in. My interest is in your interest in this line. Is your recent actions because you despise me?"

I look down at my hands, and it is as if the fear begins to disappear. Was this how my brother felt.

"I found this book," I say. "In Ben's room. I kept it because it was the only thing I had left of him."

His face goes from a hard straight and narrow, to something of shock, and disbelief. From what I can gather, he didn't know that Ben had taken this book, or even that I found it.

"Get out," he says sharply.

I look up at him confused.

"What?" I say unsure, frozen there.

"Get out of the car," he says opening the door. The way he forces the door open I am sure that the rage is back. The same anger he felt when Ben was still alive. It was the wrong answer, and now I am going to pay for it.

I get out of the car and walk over to him, trying to prepare myself. It is then that the strangest thing happens; my father doesn't come up to me, but walks over to the nearby bench, with the book in hand. He stops in front of a garbage can and tosses it inside the bin. This causes me to stop and just stand there staring at him.

"Come over here," he says.

I close the final couple of feet to him and stand right in front of him. He looks at me, and then the garbage can. He doesn't say anything, but places his hand inside his inside jacket pocket, pulling out the silver lighter and hands it to me. He straightens his suit and as he walks he places a hand on shoulder.

"Make sure to give me the lighter when you are done," he says walking back to the car.

This is the way that I lose the very last thing that I had of my brother. I stare at the fire as it grows, consuming the pages, consuming the quote that he had understood to be his own. I can now understand without any doubt what my brother was feeling that day when he finally decided to do something. It is the very same feeling that I am experiencing right now.

Hopelessness


End file.
